''Lloyd's Evening Post'', also known as ''The London Packet'' and ''Lloyd's Evening Post and British Chronicle'', was a British evening newspaper published tri-weekly in London from 1757 to 1808. Founded shortly after the ''
London Chronicle'' and similar in format, it came out on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, alternating in "friendly rivalry" with the ''London Chronicle'' which came out on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday.
History
The ''Lloyd's Evening Post'' was founded in July 1757 by James Emonson (a former partner of
William Bowyer), and was published from Emonson's printing office in St John's Square,
Clerkenwell
Clerkenwell ( ) is an area of central London, England.
Clerkenwell was an Civil Parish#Ancient parishes, ancient parish from the medieval period onwards, and now forms the south-western part of the London Borough of Islington. The St James's C ...
. According to the
colophon of the July 14–16, 1762 edition, copies of the paper could be purchased from W. Nicoll in St. Paul's Church Yard, and letters to the editor and advertisements were accepted at
Lloyd's Coffee House and at the publisher's.
John Rivington (1756–1785), a member of the
Rivington publishing family, began working for Emonson in 1777 and took over the printing business when Emonson retired. Complicating matters somewhat was another tri-weekly, ''The London Packet'', which was founded in 1771 and in 1777 changed its subtitle to "The New Lloyd's Evening Post".
The ''Lloyd's Evening Post'' issue for June 8–10, 1778 announced that the newspaper would henceforth be published by Rivington at 59
Paternoster Row
Paternoster Row is a street in the City of London that was a centre of the London publishing trade, with booksellers operating from the street. Paternoster Row was described as "almost synonymous" with the book trade. It was part of an area call ...
. From 1784 to 1790, the paper was published by J. Hancock at 23 Paternoster Row. It was subsequently published by Thomas Spilsbury and Son at 57
Snowhill. The Spilsbury family remained its publishers until the paper's demise in 1808. For a few months in 1805, the Scottish writer
Robert Heron served as the paper's editor. He had hoped to buy a share in it as well, but his perpetual financial difficulties made that impossible. Heron died penniless two years later in the fever ward of the
St Pancras Workhouse.
In the first decade of the 19th century, the rise of daily newspapers had led not only to the end of ''Lloyd's Evening Post'' but also several other tri-weekly publications such as the ''
London Evening Post'', the ''
Evening Post'', and the short-lived ''Inquisitor'' (published by John Browne Bell, the son of the literary publisher
John Bell).
[Morison, Stanley (2009)]
''The English Newspaper, 1622-1932''
pp. 137; 183, 227. Cambridge University Press. The ''London Chronicle'', which by 1801 was selling twice as many copies as ''Lloyd's Evening Post'' (as indicated by the amount of
stamp duty
Stamp duty is a tax that is levied on single property purchases or documents (including, historically, the majority of legal documents such as cheques, receipts, military commissions, marriage licences and land transactions). Historically, a ...
the papers paid), managed to hang on until 1823.
Library collections
The
Burney Collection of Newspapers at the
British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. Based in London, it is one of the largest libraries in the world, with an estimated collection of between 170 and 200 million items from multiple countries. As a legal deposit li ...
has digitized copies of the paper from 1757 to 1805. The
Guildhall Library holds the complete run to 1808 either in print or on
microfilm.
City of London
The City of London, also known as ''the City'', is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county and Districts of England, local government district with City status in the United Kingdom, city status in England. It is the Old town, his ...
Guildhall Library Collections: Newspapers
. Retrieved 16 May 2014.
References
External links
Complete digitised copy of ''Lloyd's Evening Post'', November 5–7, 1778from the
University of Florida
The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida, United States. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida and a preem ...
George A. Smathers Libraries
{{Authority control
London newspapers
Defunct newspapers published in the United Kingdom
Publications established in 1757