John Beer

Many thanks to Fiona Moate for sending me these pictures from the version of Black Beauty illustrated by John Beer. It was published by Jarrolds in the 1890s, and is generally reasonably priced. Many of these images are quite small and appear throughout the text, rather than as full page illustrations.  Black Beauty as originally published had no illustrations:  John Beer’s versions were certainly amongst the earliest, if not the first.

The Victorians never did shy away from death, and they go right for it with the image of Ginger on the cart. For more examples from this illustrator, please see this post on my blog.

Jarrold & Sons, Norwich, 1894