... The Diary is best known for his reporting of the national disasters that struck England while he was keeping it: the great plague of 1665, the great fire of London in 1666, the Dutch attack on the Medway in 1667. The record of these and other public events is used by historians and read with enjoyment by schoolchildren, because his reporter's eye was as keenly trained on them as it was on his private experience. What he was doing in such reporting was more significant than may appear at first glance, because the censorship imposed by the government of Charles II ensured that there no newspapers at this period except for a single government-controlled information sheet, the London Gazette. It meant that no proper record of public events was being kept, and even parliamentary debates were not allowed to be reported. ...As well as being a diarist, Pepys is regarded as one of the most important naval administrators in England's history. He rose to a position of eminence and power and was proud of his work in organizing, disciplining and developing the navy, and in insisting that shipbuilding must be properly funded. Those who most admire the administrator are sometimes ambivalent about the Diary.