Some assigned the pestilence to witchcraft, others declared that the waters of the wells and streams had been poisoned.

Serious riots occurred in many places, and great numbers of people fell victims to the fury of the mob under the suspicion of being connected in some way with the ravages of the pestilence.

The Jews, ever the objects of popular hostility, engendered by ignorance and superstition, were among the chief sufferers.

Bands of marauders wandered through the country plundering the houses left empty by the death of all their occupants, and from end to end death and suffering were universal.
Although all classes had suffered heavily the ravages of the disease were, as is always the case, greater among the poor than among the rich, the insanitary conditions of their life, and their coarser and commoner food rendering them more liable to its influence; no rank, however, was exempted, and no less than three Archbishops of Canterbury were carried off in succession by the pestilence within a year of its appearance.
During the months which succeeded his marriage Sir Walter Somers lived quietly and happily with his wife at Westerham.

It was not until late in the year that the plague approached the neighbourhood.