Hugh Thomson was born in Coleraine Co.Londonderry and worked initially in the factory of the publishers Marcus Ward engaged in Christmas card colour printing. He attended art classes in Belfast but he gained most of his tuition from the artist and designer John Vinycomb. Early work for the English Illustrated Magazine established him as a fine illustrator of days of nostalgia of the idyllic world of stage coaches and Victorian fashion and the novels of Jane Austen , Fanny Burney , Mrs.Gaskell among others. His most prolific period was between 1900 and 1914 when his skill of water-colour illustration was put to good work in the gift books of the publisher Heinemann and others. He was elected RI in 1897 and exhibited at the FAS, Leicester Galleries and Walker’s Galleries. Collections of his work are held in the BM, V&A, and Ulster Museums. Ref: Spielmann Jerrold. Hugh Thomson. 1931.