 On the Gateshead riverbank, a few yards downstream of the old bridge, stood the splendid new mill premises of Messrs. J. Wilson & Sons, worsted manufacturers.This large gaslight-lit building had been erected after a fire which destroyed their previous premises, on the same site, three years before the events of this great fire.At half past midnight on Friday 6 October 1854, the mill was discovered to be on fire; the cry was raised and immediately the streets crowded with people hurrying to the scene of the growing conflagration.