Johnston was born in 1866 in Jamberoo, New South Wales, to an Irish-born father and Australian-born mother. He worked successively as a bank clerk, labourer, journalist, land-agent and shopkeeper in Campbelltown, Goulburn, Kempsey, and Sydney, while also writing regularly for the Bulletin. His books include The Electric Gun: A Tale of Love and Socialism (1911), a futuristic novel; Australian White Slaves (1911), a work of social criticism written under the pseudonym ‘R.G.S. Williams’; The Undying Warrior (1944), a collection of poetry; and The Voice of the Bush (1944), an illustrated book for children.
Johnson often worked his family members into his writing. In The Electric Gun, the main characters bear the Christian names of his children. In The Voice of the Bush, the human protagonists are his grandchildren (Deirdre and Judith) through his youngest daughter Eileen. (He lived for some time with Eileen’s family in Melbourne while working on this book.)
He married twice and had five children: his daughter Enid Delalande was a pioneering woman journalist for the ABC in Brisbane.
He died in Auchenflower, Brisbane, in 1945.
(Source: Bibliography supplied by Johnston’s great grandson, Jonathan Wooding, Sir Warwick Fairfax Professor of Celtic Studies, School of Letters, Art, and Media, University of Sydney.)
