The London Gazette

United Kingdom, 1665 (as The Oxford Gazette) Born of the Great Plague. When the plague drove Charles II and his court out of London to the relative safety of Oxford, the Oxford Gazette appeared in November 1665, and when the court returned to the capital it became the London Gazette. It is an official journal of record rather than a paper for browsing: today it is published by TSO on behalf of The National Archives and carries statutory, business and state notices. For anyone tracing British history through print, its back issues form a thread that runs from Restoration England to the present.