Guy Johnson (c.1740 – 5 March 1788) was an Irish-born military officer and diplomat for the Crown during the American Revolutionary War. Johnson was a son-in-law (as well as either a nephew or a cousin) of the influential British Superintendent of Indian Affairs Sir William Johnson, and took over that role when Sir William died in 1774 on the eve of the war.

Just before the war broke out, Johnson was a deputy to Sir William, as well as a colonel in the New York militia and a member of the New York assembly. When the American revolutionary Committee of Safety sought power in 1775, Johnson worked to control of the Tryon County courts, assisted by fellow loyalists Sir John Johnson (Sir William's son) and Colonel Daniel Claus (another son-in-law of Sir William). These three also commanded the three regiments of the Tryon County militia. However, American patriots drove these men out of power, and they fled with other loyalist refugees to British-controlled Canada.

Johnson worked to secure the allegiance of the Iroquois at a council at Oswego, New York in July of 1775, traveled to England in 1775 with Joseph Brant, and then back to New York City in 1776 after the city had been retaken by the British, not returning to Canada until 1779, a prolonged absence for which he was sharply criticized. Those years were eventful ones on the New York frontier, and included the Wyoming Valley Massacre and Cherry Valley Massacre, which were carried out by his subordinates.

Back in Niagara in 1779, Johnson helped to provide for the Iroquois refugees from the Sullivan Expedition, and then helped to coordinate counter-raids. Sir John Johnson took over in 1783, and Guy Johnson returned to London, where he died five years later.

External links

• More about the Benjamin West portrait at the National Gallery of Art
• Biography at Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online