I mean, I don't really know where to start with this because there are tons of history journals. Historical articles written in journals are generally where the most "current" interpretations of history are discussed, and made up a huge portion of my research for essays in undergrad.

https://www.jstor.org/ is a great resource for finding such articles and journals, and even with a rudimentary search of "History of Europe" you will see articles from journals such as The Slavonic and East European Review, History Ireland, Historical Reflections etc.

While in general history books might be more popular in the mainstream than journals, it does not mean that history journals are not out there.

I would also say it is fair to say that a lot (if not most) people have read or heard about some history book, or at least know that historians write books and not papers.

That might be because the average reader might only be interested in a very narrow period or geographic region in regards to history, and as such would rather buy a book on that specific topic than subscribe to a journal which covers the entirety of Slavic history for example.

It's possible that the misconception is due to the different audiences of historical books versus journal articles. Book authors tend to write for a broad audience, whether that be undergraduates/graduates/the public. Those same historians who publish in the (plethora of) historical journals write for others in their fields. The historical journals are typically specialized but there are a few that have a wide readership. American historians may subscribe to William and Mary Quarterly, American Historical Association, and other general publications. I second the suggestion to browse www.jstor.org for journal articles. H-net.org is another good site for book reviews.

Others brought up good points, but I think History lacks certain criteria that make the scientific paper format make sense.

Say I’m doing a chemistry lab. I might mention a ton about the background chemical reactions that make my lab possible, why what I’m synthesizing is important and the like. Then a good chunk of the paper will be how I took all the theoretical chemistry and put it into practice into my small example(from the strategic to the tactical level of you will).

The steps I show in my process would prove to the reader that this is legitimate science, that I applied the theoretical chemistry correctly and these were the results as part of the application process.

In History, I cannot think of a situation where I use history for some end(like the synthesize in the chemical paper) and then have to prove to the reader that all my work is sound. I mean...maybe I could write where history gives us precedent to solve a given issue. Like how courts use legal precedence to help answer modern legal questions. Or where people in history learned from the further past (say, Washington using Fabius Maximus’ style ware fare to win the American independence war) but this usually devolves into already established fact(like Washington’s love for the classics) or mostly speculation( i.e comparisons of current politics to different situations and expected causes and outcomes, like comparing the President to a certain failed art student with a Charlie Chaplin mustache).