In the plot behind, the hut that his wife Agnes used for her cooking was emptied before it also fell prey to the flying embers - and their three goats, the fowls and a pair of pigs were also taken to safety in a nearby croft. The villagers of St Sidwell, a hamlet just outside Exeter's city walls, had helped Gwyn of Polruan to save what he could of the family's possessions, few that they were, but most of what was in the single-room had gone up in flames.
They had carried leather buckets of turbid water from the well, but there was nothing they could do to save the little building, made of wood-framed wattle plastered with cob - a mixture of clay, straw and dung. The big Cornishman stood impotently in the road outside, watching the destruction in company with his neighbours, who although sympathetic to his loss, were more concerned over the threat to their own roofs by the flying sparks. With a crackling roar, Gwyn's home of twelve years was destroyed in as many minutes. The air became filled with specks of black ash and fragments of burning straw floated from the flaming thatch of the cottage. There was a thunderous crash as the roof fell in and a fountain of sparks erupted into the night sky.
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