Diary of Samuel Pepys - Complete 1665 N.S. by Samuel Pepys

The Diary of Samuel Pepys #6

by Samuel Pepys

Pepys diary complete for the year 1665

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Autobiography, Diary, Biography

Paperback

First published November 3, 2006

About the author

Samuel Pepys was an English naval administrator and Member of Parliament, who is now most famous for his diary. Although Pepys had no maritime experience, he rose by patronage, hard work and his talent for administration, to be the Chief Secretary to the Admiralty under King James II. His influence and reforms at the Admiralty were important in the early professionalization of the Royal Navy.

The detailed private diary he kept during 1660–1669 was first published in the nineteenth century, and is one of the most important primary sources for the English Restoration period. It provides a combination of personal revelation and eyewitness accounts of great events, such as the Great Plague of London, the Second Dutch War and the Great Fire of London.

His surname is usually pronounced /'pi:ps/ ('peeps').

Reviews

[Darwin8u · Rating 5 out of 5]

Want of money in the Navy puts everything out of order. Men grow mutinous. And nobody here to mind the business of the Navy but myself."
-- 31 October 1665, Diary of Samuel Pepys



The sixth volume (1665, with 121,000 words) has been one of the most eventful years of Pepys' diary. He sees his fortune triple, due largely to multiple roles he is playing in the government (Treasurer of Tanger, Surveyor of the Victuals) in addition to his day job as Clerk of the Acts to the Navy Board. His skill and work ethic have earned him not just the attention and favor of Lord Sandwich, but also the Duke of Yorke and occasionally the King. This year the plague hits London hard. Those who can move their families out of the city. The Plague peaks during the Summer and begins to pull back as Winter freeze comes on.



Not much slows Pepys down, however, when it comes to the ladies. Sometimes I think the only reason Pepys learned basic French and Spanish was so he could write in code all the opportunities he takes to grope, fondle, kiss, and seduce the local wives and wenches. If there hasn't already been a PhD written on status, sex, and the mid-seventeenth century, Pepys' diary would be fertile ground for one.

Although the various episodes of Pepys behaving badly do spice the diary up, it isn't the reason I keep getting drawn further into this massive work. Pepys is a perfect cipher for the times. He unlocks so much about the enlightenment, the native curiosity of the times, the post Cromwell rationality and bureaucracy that starts to creep into government. Every pages seems to hold amazing tidbits. For example, the following passage could have easily come out of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, but instead was given by Mr. Henry Slingsby (the Master of the Mint):

27 January 1665 "...talking with Mr. Slingsby, who is a very ingenious person, about the Mint and the coinage of money. Among other things, he argues that there being 7000000l coined in the Rump time, and, by the Treasurers of that time, it being their opinion that the Rump money was in all payments, one with another, about a tenth part of all their money -- 'then,' says he (to my question), 'the nearest guess we can make is that the money passing up and down in business is 7000000l'

To another question of mine, he made me fully understand that the old law of prohibiting bullion to be exported is, and ever was, a folly and an injury, rather than a good. Arguing thus -- that if the exportations exceed importations, then the balance must be brought home in money; which , when our merchants know cannot be carried out again, they will forbear to bring home in money, but let it lie abroad for trade or keep in foreign banks. Or if our importations exceed our exportations, then to keep credit, the merchants will and must find ways of carrying out money by stealth, which is a most easy thing to do and is everywhere done, and therefore the law against signifies nothing in the world -- besides, that it si seen that where money is free, there is great plenty; where it is restrained, as here, there is great want, as in Spain."

Here are my other Pepys diary reviews:

Vol 1: 1660, 117,000 words
Vol 2: 1661, 84,000 words
Vol 3: 1662, 105,000 words
Vol 4: 1663, 159,000 words
Vol 5: 1664, 132,000 words
Vol 7: 1666, 151,000 words
Vol 8: 1667, 201,000 words
Vol 9: 1668, 128,000 words; 1669, 52,500 words

[Hon Lady Selene · Rating 5 out of 5]

The year of the Great Plague.
Samuel is busy, busy with the Dutch, busy with Tangier, busy. And one week after the next, he writes of how the Mortality Bill increases, from 700 to 6000 victims.

It was a very hot summer, Samuel himself saying everyone agrees that the weather had never been that hot in UK. That year we lost 2.5% of the English population, a staggering number. The Royals were evacuated to the countryside and even the poor decided to leave London. Soon, the villages close to London were too suspicions of anything coming from the Capital and didn't allow people to move or pass through their villages. Samuel even has to lie that he lives in Woolwich, a separate village back then.

The outbreak was concentrated in London, but it affected other areas as well. Perhaps the most famous example was the village of Eyam in Derbyshire. The plague allegedly arrived with a merchant carrying a parcel of cloth sent from London. The villagers imposed a quarantine on themselves to stop the further spread of the disease. This prevented the disease from moving into surrounding areas, but around 33% of the village's inhabitants died over a period of fourteen months.

Samuel notes that each day he sees more houses and shops in quarantine, his boy-servant Will gets sick and even his own physician passes away.

The Mayor of London imposes a 9PM curfew on the healthy, so that the sick may have liberty to go out for air and so city officials may dispose of the bodies easier, Samuel witnessing a mass of the dead on the street, late in the night. Afterwards, he promises himself not to go out after dark.

But, I leave it to Sam to ask the truly important questions, such as the one on September 3d: "Had put on my new coloured silk suit and my new periwig, bought a while since, but dared not wear it because the plague was in Westminster when I bought it; and it is a wonder what will be the fashion after the plague is done, as to periwigs, for nobody will dare to buy any hair, for fear of the infection, that it had been cut off the heads of the people dead by plague".

[Anita · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Plague Year. I was morbidly excited to read this year's chronicle, and it didn't really disappoint. Maybe didn't capture all the feelings I would've liked, but gives some insight into the dread of infection and attempts to outrun disease. Glad he made it thru. Glad his family did too, but I'm really feeling sorry for his wife at this point, as Pepys obviously has an overwhelming obsession with chasing women. It was charming in previous years, now it's kindof worrisome.

[Shimaa]

A lot of boring daily life events!

[Lukerik · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Story So Far...
Pepys is quite happy doing odd jobs for his relative Sir Edward Mountagu, but momentous events are about to overtake him. He goes to sea with Sir Edward, who is in secret negotiations with Charles II for the restoration of the monarchy. They go to the Netherlands and Charles returns to England on Pepys’s ship. Sir Edward is promoted to being the Earl of Sandwich and Pepys rises with him, becoming one of the highest ranking civil servants in the country. Pepys tries to come to terms with his high social position but goes off the rails a bit. He drinks so heavily and does so little work that, despite knowing he doesn’t get sacked, I found myself really worrying for him. He gets a grip on himself, however, and knuckles down to do some work, his stock with the Duke of York thereby rising.

Now read on...
In this year his career ratchets up a couple of notches as he comes to the attention of the king and starts operating at a very high political level. His busyness would break a weaker man and he makes a shed-load of money. This year must leave naval historians weak with joy for the inside information on the 2nd Dutch war. The incompetence with which it is prosecuted by the English is stunning. I was a civil servant for over a decade and things are still done similarly. I think it must be a cultural thing. This is also the year of the plague. A fascinating record, and something which takes Pepys out of his usual stomping ground. He commits a number of improprieties along the way and in this year begins to record them in a mixture of Spanish, French and English. My flatmate is a Spanish philologist so I got her to translate them for me (once she could stop gasping with shock). Pepys met John Evelyn I think in 1664 but this year he makes friends with him. I now have to to read his diary too. The standout passage for me was his handling of the arranged marriage. A sequence of unalloyed comic delight.

[Ian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Samuel Pepys is cashing in on the current pandemic, which seems entirely in character. It's a while since I last read the diaries, so I picked this up from the eLibrary and reminded myself how good Pepys is. Escape from the present into a world of pandemic, incompetent and corrupt politicians, rampant misogyny, massive wealth disparity, bickering with our European neighbours, etc. etc. etc. Ah - progress, eh?

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

15 Minute Drama

From BBC Radio 4:
Hattie Naylor's dramatisation of the 17th-century diaries. With Kris Marshall.

I do love these series and the music is splendid.

[John Isles · Rating 5 out of 5]

Slowly I am working through the complete Pepys Diary, which in this volume covers the year of the Great Plague, and treats of Pepys's growing influence and wealth, and his many misadventures with the ladies, which were largely omitted from earlier editions. Daniel Defoe's Journal of the Plague Year is a more vivid account of that first aspect, though it's a work of fiction. And now on to the next volume of the diary, covering the year of the Great Fire of London....

[Adam Stevenson · Rating 4 out of 5]

1665 was a full year for Pepys, and for London. As the war with the Dutch commenced, the great plague stalked the streets, killing thousands. Surprising then that Pepys frequently finds himself remarking on how happy is and how he is experiencing ‘the greatest joy I ever had in my life’.

Certainly, his wealth doubles during 1665 (and had grown a hundredfold since 1660). Part of this is his own hard work. In a very revealing passage on November 1st, he tells a friend how his good fortune has come through luck, a few good contacts and through working hard enough to be essential. During the year, he gains two extra jobs; as Treasurer to Tangier and Surveyor of Victualling - a job he invented for himself. He also makes a good lump sum after some dodgy dealings with captured Dutch prizes as well as the usual perquisites and bribes. He’s a moral man though, he’ll only accept a bribe from someone he has already decided to give a contract to, giving it back if he has no intention of choosing them.

He’ll also help anyone who will let them fondle their wife or daughter. The usual cringeworthy pursuit of maids and shopkeepers carries on, but something about the plague (or merely the absence of his wife into the country) means that he is without doubt a sexual predator for much of this year. At one point his French (which he uses to cover his indiscretions) becomes Greek. At another, he strains a finger after a night fooling with a woman. This element of Pepys makes him seriously despicable, but the benefit of the diary is how his full personality shine on the page, good as well as bad.

We have him laying terrified in bed at the thought of robbers, consoling old friends, laughing uncontrollably at the snoring of others in a shared ship’s cabin. We have the man brought to ‘ecstasy’ by good music, who described jollity and laughing every few pages. We hear him trying out that old sleepover game of ‘light as a feather, stiff as a board’. We have Pepys’s unimpressed reaction to people’s hunting stories, a prank where he tries to get a man to kiss him and his reflection that if he carried a watch, he’d be forever checking it.

This year begins Pepys time with the Royal Society. He was to become the President for two terms and as such has his name on the title page of Newton’s ‘Principia Mathematica’. It seems each Royal Society meeting involves the killing of a dog by some method - cruel as it sounds, the sheer litany of dead dogs becomes very funny. As the society quietens down during the plague, he grows a friendship with John Evelyn - remarking on his conceitedness, but accepting that a man so clever can afford to be so.

The plague does affect Pepys, but for him it’s a nuisance which occasionally scares him (by running into diseased bodies at night) but more frequently exasperates him, such as the different bodies of government being split up into various country estates. The fear of other plague texts doesn’t much enter into the text.

Aside from everything else, we have his wonderful way with words. His description of a ship laden with expensive cargo, peppercorns rolling into the cracks, is very clear. We also hear about his ‘grutchings’ of pain, a man who did not have ‘a turd of kindness’ and someone he hopes never to ‘soil my fingers with him again’.

Reading Pepys is a very difficult thing - aside from the sheer amount of information and detail- we are let into the life of a man who is such a brilliant, humorous and lively person until his relation with women comes up. Then we are let into the life of a lecher, a fondler and someone who would have been had up by Yewtree today. I can’t forgive Pepys his horrid actions, but have to try an be compassionate enough to take Pepys as he presents himself. What else can we do with the other people in our life?

[Ria · Rating 5 out of 5]

A pretty sad year for Pepys, there is a lot of stress and foreign problems with the Dutch war not going very well and at home there is the awful threat of the Plague.
Very moving and graphic in his descriptions of him seeing corpses being carried and houses locked up with the people who are infected inside.
Such powerful writing and you feel such an immediacy you as a reader are transported back to that time.
He loses many colleagues and also some relatives and friends too and he is in a panic about leaving his affairs unfinished in case the worst happens.
A very melancholy year and this is reflected in his lifestyle changes, he still attends church but as for his hobbies, the most we hear of him pursuing them is his love of music when he has friends around and they play and sing.
There is very little theatre going and he hasn't bought so many books.
This may be subconciously to the fact of the plague he is worrying about his mortality, all in all a very bleak time for Pepys.
Though to be fair there is a lot of amorous dalliances and he has started a sequence of his "erotic" passages in foreign languages to disguise his actions.
This maybe due to shame or the fact he may suspect another person of finding or reading his diary if the worst happens with the high mortality rate this year.

[Helen · Rating 4 out of 5]

1665, the plague year. Really interesting as an account of
living through the plague in London, with a lot of incidental details about everyday life. I'm always surprised at how much time was spent travelling by boat, for instance. You get a really good sense of what the river really meant to Londoners, along with some obvious things I had never even thought of, such as the origin of the name of Horseferry Road (17th century car ferry, essentially). The other daily details are fun too (what do you do when you need the loo in somebody else's house and the maid has forgotten to put a chamberpot under the bed...?). The plague is first mentioned at the end of April and has not completely gone by the end of the year. Also England was at war with the Dutch, which put a great strain on the under resourced navy. The shenanigans of financing this (and profiting from it) are a bit beyond me but it was obviously a financially successful year for Samuel Pepys. What a groper he was though - and although some of it is funny, especially the bits in a mix of English, French, Spanish and Latin, there is a darker side - clearly fathers and husbands were willing to offer up their daughters and wives in order to get out of being pressed into navy service. Glad I am not a 17th century London woman, or indeed a servant of the Pepys family. Fire next!

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the year the plague makes it to London. Pepys' description of the shops shut down, the red crosses on doors, meeting corpses in the street and the fear as the plague tally increases is chilling. I was preoccupied with this story line this year (more than 68 000 died of plague in 1665). Also this year, war with the Dutch, Pepys' preoccupation with work and the Tangier victuals and Lord Sandwich's downfall and ostracization to Spain (as ambassador). Despite this Pepys feels his year was positive and he kept up the womanizing during these times, now described in French.