History

History of the Fire Service

Even the earliest known civilizations had great respect for the power of fire. Many groups thought of fire as gods or spirits and held rituals, gave sacrifices and conducted religious ceremonies, all revolving around the mysterious phenomenon of fire.

The first organized fire fighting force than can be traced was established in Rome by Augustus Caesar around 23 BC They were organized much in the same way as many fire department of modern time are, in that the organization was prompted as the result of a major fire with disastrous results.

These first fire fighters were call the familia publica and were slaves, about 600 in number. They were stationed around the gates of the city and gave alarm to inhabitants if a fire was spotted. Being slaves these first fire fighters were slow at spotting fires and somewhat unwilling to take the risks necessary to fight them. After another disastrous fire in Rome about 6 AD the Familia Publica was replaced with a corps of Vigiles who were to protect the city of Rome for the next 500 years. The Vigiles were a group of freed men some 7,000 strong and protected a population of 1 million.

Their responsibilities were to provide a fire fighting unit, fire prevention duties and inspection of buildings. The organization of the Vigiles was copied from the Roman militia with officers and companies of fire fighters operating within a chain of command. They were divided into seven battalions of 1,000 men each and were commanded by the equivalent of today's fire chief. The fire chief or prefect was an equestrian ranked officer who was directly responsible to the emperor. The cost of maintaining the corps was paid by the public treasury.

The first fire pump was invented somewhere near the 4th century BC by a Greek. This first simple device, which was a double cylinder piston pump, remained the basic mechanical method for pumping water for hundreds of years.

Much of what occurred in Rome and other early civilizations are the roots of fire fighting and fire prevention materials that are used today. Most concepts used today can be traced back nearly two thousand years.

Organized fire fighting disappeared for nearly a thousand years after the fall of Rome. In the 10th century, the French Normans conquered England and during the reign introduced the curfew concept for controlling fire in England. Under the Norman rule all house holders were to extinguish all fires by sunset A metal cover was used to extinguish the fire on an open hearth. The Normans called the cover a "Couvre Fou"" which on the English tongue became "curfew".

There is no written record of organized fire fighting for another 200 years and little known and recorded information about fire fighting activities exist until the 17th century.

After the great Fire of London in 1666, the city organized fire protection companies and required certain amounts of equipment to be on hand by all residents for use in combating fires. Equipment included leather buckets, ladders, shovels, and brass squirts. Brass squirts were large metal syringes, designed by the Portuguese, with handles on each side and a piston rod in the center. The nozzle of the squirt was placed in a bucket of water, the piston rod drawn back to fill it and water then discharged on the fire.

Another spin off of the Great London Fire was the advent of the first fire insurance companies in England. These companies has three basic duties; they posted fire marks to identify insured and protected properties, trained firefighters and salvage men who protected insured premises only, and they responded to actual calls for fire to the protected properties.

These insurance company fire fighters became England's first organized fire brigades. Gradually the brigades began competing to attend any fire for the honor of having reached the fire first. Modern traditions of fast response stems from these beginnings over 200 years ago. The traditional idea of fighting any fire also started in these early insurance company brigades.

The first hoses used by fire suppression personnel was made of leather and was designed by a Dutchman named General Jan Van Der Hyden, which first allowed fire fighters to carry water via a hose to the fire. These first hoses were 50 feet in length, and is considered the standard length even today. They were equipped with brass screw joints, allowing each section to be connected to another. The hose was sewn together to form a tube, but because must of the sewn hoses failed after use, the hose was later riveted together at the seam.

One early pump used in England consisted of a barrel mounted on wheels or a sled with a single pump immersed in the water barrel and operated by pumping handles. A swiveling nozzle called the "monitor," or gooseneck, above the cylinder allowed the water to be squirted at the flames. The range of the stream was so short that the pump had to be close to the fire, and many of the pumps actually caught fire themselves.

By 1721, an Englishman named Richard Newsham, developed a piston pump which operated by chains running over toothed quadrants, rocked up and down by the pump levers on each side. It required 20 pump handle operators and one nozzleman to run the pump.

The first fire recorded in America was in Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. The fire occurred in the community blockhouse. Subsequent fire destroyed almost every building in the settlement. The Pilgrims at Plymouth, MA also suffered devastating fires in 1623. Many of these early fires were caused and spread due to the type of building materials. Roofs were made of thatch, structures were build close together, and chimneys were constructed of wood and mortar or mud and lined with the same material.

Fire fighting in New Amsterdam (New York), as in all American colonies, was strictly a volunteer effort that provided for bucket brigades to fight fires that occurred in the wooden and thatch buildings.

Peter Stuyvesant, the feisty one-legged Governor of New York, decided in 1647 that order must be brought to fire fighting. In that year the town passed an ordinance that banned wooden chimneys and thatched roofs, and required chimneys to be swept regularly to clear them of "dangerous wood tar."

The fines collected by fire wardens from those who failed inspections or those with house that caught fire were used to buy ladders, hooks, and buckets. The city leaders also appointed volunteers to patrol the streets at night and sound an alarm for fire with rattles that they carried.

The "rattle watch" was disliked by some of the citizens who renamed them "prowlers." During a fire the rattle watch organized and directed the fire fighting operation. Each resident was required to keep three buckets filled with water on their front doorstep after dark for fire fighting purposes. These first fire regulations, mandated by Stuyvesant, succeeded in protecting New York for nearly 100 years.

The Boston fire of 1711 caused the creation of fire wards to respond to fires and direct fire fighting efforts of the citizens. Another innovation to grow out of the Boston Fire was the Mutual Fire Societies, which consisted of about 20 people banded together to help each other in case of fire, by fighting the fire and salvaging the contents. Each member of the society would respond to the alarm with a bucket, a bed key (to dismantle the owner's bed), and a salvage bag bearing the societies' emblem.

They were largely responsible for fire fighting, preventing loss of life, dismantling the bed, removing valuables, and guarding the premises after the fire. Fire Societies became social as well as fire fighting associations, setting a pattern for organized volunteer fire fighting groups. These beginnings would be a large influence on how volunteer fire fighting would dominate America for the next century and a half.

In 1736, Benjamin Franklin organized the first volunteer fire company in Philadelphia. At the same time, the first fire insurance company in America, the "Friendly Society" was formed in Charleston, South Carolina. A major fire in Charleston on November 18, 1740, financially wiped out the company.

The Friendly Society was well known by its fire mark called the "Hand in Hand." Many companies were formed and if you did not have a fire mark for that company, they would not fight a fire on your property. Franklin's company used the "Green Tree" fire mark and would not insure a house if it had trees growing in the yard.

Initially, as these fire companies started, the fire fighters protected the premises with their company fire mark and were paid by the insurance company. As volunteer groups increased, the insurance companies did not maintain their own fire fighting units, but would pay the first fire company that put water on the fire. This practice of reimbursement created rivalries that often resulted in brawls and became a discredit for the fire service.

By the 1800's, volunteer companies had improved their efforts with better equipment. Newer and bigger pumping engines, hose carts and ladder wagons lead to the pride of the company which often resulted in rivalries between companies.

Membership in a local fire company became a privilege and most fire companies held a great deal of influence in community politics, not unlike many departments throughout the country today.