The Illustrated London News was among the first journals to carry illustrations of contemporary events. The journal, which started in 1842 before the advent of photography, had to rely on engravings printed from woodblocks until 1887.
The first article in the Illustrated London News relating to Japan appeared in May 1853. It was devoted to "The United states Expedition to Japan" and included a portrait of Commodore Perry and an engraving of the U.S. Navy's steam Frigate Mississippi. In 1855 Admiral Stirling's visit to Nagasaki was covered in some detail, and sketches of Nagasaki were reproduced.
The most interesting reports in the journal were those contributed in the years between 1861 and 1887 by the artist Charles Wirgman (1832-1891), who founded and edited the Japan Punch, a satirical record of life in the foreign settlement. He was a talented artist who had the ability to draw quickly. He had an engaging personality and became a close friend of Ernest Satow, who was then a young Japanese-language student but who became the leading Japan expert of his era and British Minister to Japan from 1895-1900.