The Cornhill Magazine

The Cornhill Magazine was a monthly literary journal popular during the Victorian era. It was founded by George Murray Smith in 1859, and published by his company Smith, Elder & Co., situated at 65 Cornhill in London. The magazine took it’s name from the company’s address.

The first issue of The Cornhill Magazine, was published in January 1860. It was edited by the renowned author and illustrator William Makepeace Thackeray, who continued to edit the magazine until 1871, when Sir Leslie Stephen took over. Issues of the magazine typically contained a combination of articles, short stories, and serializations of new novels.

During the early days of publication, The Cornhill Magazine had a large circulation that climbed to around 110,000. However, due to the emergence of a number of competing publications, such as Temple Bar (also launched in 1860 ), by 1870, The Cornhill Magazine‘s circulation had dropped to 20,000. So, when Stephen took over as editor, the magazine was already on the decline. By the time he left, in 1882, the circulation had further decreased to 12,000. Subsequent editors include Ronald Gorell Barnes, Peter Quennell, and Leonard Huxley.

In 1912, the Scottish publisher John Murray bought the magazine, and continued to publish it until 1975.

During its years of publication, The Cornhill Magazine published a number of horror stories by popular authors of the time including Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “The Ring of Thoth” (published January 1890) and D. K, Broster’s Couching at the Door (published December 1933).

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