Oliver Johnson was an American abolitionist, journalist, editor, lecturer, and Underground Railroad conductor who was once described as the "first lieutenant" of William Lloyd Garrison, the editor of The Liberator newspaper. Johnson regarded slavery as the "sum of all villainies" and in the period leading up to the American Civil War was so loathed in the south that "as quiet as a Quaker in his personal disposition, yet the time was...when Oliver Johnson would have lost his life within forty-eight hours after crossing Mason and Dixon's line." In 1844 Johnson was publisher of the American edition of the Narrative of the Life of Moses Grandy. Johnson wrote a biography of his friend and colleague called Garrison: An Outline of His Life. After the war, Johnson was employed as an editor and writer at various New York-based newspapers including the Tribune and the Independent.