The Illustrated London News was a magazine founded by Herbert Ingram and his friend Mark Lemon, the editor of Punch magazine. With Lemon as his chief adviser, the first edition of the Illustrated London News appeared on 14 May, 1842. Costing sixpence, the magazine had sixteen pages and thirty-two woodcuts. The first edition included pictures of the war in Afghanistan, a train crash in France, a steamboat explosion in Canada and a fancy dress ball at Buckingham Palace.


Although 26,000 copies of the first number were disposed of, there was a great falling off in the sale of the second and subsequent numbers. Herbert Ingram, however, was determined to make his property a success, and one that is still spoken of as a brilliant stroke of journalistic enterprise. He sent to every clergyman in the country a copy of the number containing illustrations of the installation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and by this means secured many new subscribers.

The magazine was published weekly until 1971, when it became a monthly. From 1989, it was published bi-monthly, then quarterly and currently bi-annually.*

The Illustrated London News exists today as the Illustrated London News Group.