The Yorkshire Gazette was first published in York on 24 April 1819 by bookseller and printer John Wolstenholme. A weekly Conservative publication, it advocated landowning and farming interests and supported the Established Church. It initially comprised 4 pages and cost 7d. Wolstenholme managed the paper on behalf of a joint stock company.

Bookseller and printer Henry Bellerby took over from Wolstenholme in 1828 and increased the number of pages to 8 in July 1838. In 1839 the company bought the York Chronicle (established in 1772) which Bellerby had been publishing since 1836.The two papers were amalgamated in 1840. Bellerby was Sheriff of York in 1844.

James Lancelot Foster, a reporter to trade, succeeded Bellerby in 1852. He edited and published the Gazette for the next thirty years, increasing the paper to 12 pages in 1855. He too became a prominent citizen of the city and was Sheriff of York in 1870. Foster died in 1883 and the Gazette was bought by North and East Yorkshire Conservative Newspaper and Printing Company Ltd.

The Yorkshire Gazette went daily in 1884 but following considerable losses the paper reverted to a weekly again in 1886. It was taken over by the North of England Newspaper Company in 1905, absorbing the MaltonGazette and the South Durham and Cleveland Mercury soon afterwards. The Gazette itself was incorporated into the Yorkshire Herald in 1954.