Henry Phelps Johnston
American historian (1842–1923)
Henry Phelps Johnston (1842–1923) was a historian of the American Revolutionary War and professor at the City College of New York.
Life
Johnston was born in Trabzon, Turkey, on April 19, 1842, the son of American missionaries Thomas Pinckney Johnston and Marianne Cassandra Howe. He was educated at Hopkins Grammar School in New Haven, and Yale University, graduating B.A. in 1862. During the American Civil War he enlisted as a private in the 15th Connecticut Infantry Regiment, and was honorably discharged in July 1865 as a second lieutenant. He studied at Yale Law School from 1865 to 1867 and briefly practised as a lawyer in New York before becoming a newspaperman. From 1879 he taught at the City College of New York, retiring in 1916 as emeritus professor. After retirement he moved to Connecticut, dying on February 28, 1923, in the Middlesex Hospital, Middletown.
From 1882 to 1883, he was editor of The Magazine of American History.
With his wife, Elizabeth Kirtland Holmes, he had four sons.
The public source identifies “Henry Phelps Johnston” as american historian (1842–1923). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Henry, Phelps and Johnston.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 10, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q18911952. VIAF identifies the subject as 70174231. The Library of Congress control number is n50040314. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1842, 1923, 1862 and 1865.
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This entry incorporates text from “Henry Phelps Johnston” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.