Bertrand Ellwood Johnson was born in West Plains, Mo., in 1902. Hegraduated from the University of Oklahoma with a bachelor of arts degree in l924. He attended Harvard Law School from 1924 to 1926, and then worked in law offices in Boston. In 1929 he graduated from the University of Oklahoma law School with a bachelor of laws degree and then practiced law in Tulsa, Okla. In November 1930 he became assistant city attorney for Tulsa, and served until January 1935 when he became judge of the Court of Common Pleas of Tulsa, which office he held for seven years.
Appointed a second lieutenant in the Field Artillery Reserve in April 1932, General Johnson received a commission in the Judge Advocate General Reserve as a captain in February l935. In January 1942, the general went on extended active duty as a major with the Judge Advocate General's Department and entered the JAG School at National University, Washington, D.C. After completing the officer refresher course there in March, he became assistant to the judge advocate of Base Section I of the Services of Supply in the China-Burma-India, theater, later serving as judge advocate of the Services of Supply.  

In January 1943 he sat as a Special Judge of the United States Court for China to hear a manslaughter charge against Boater Carney a member of the Flying Tigers. 

Remaining in the China theater, General Johnson was named judge advocate of the 14th Air Force in December 1943.
Transferred to Mitchel Field, N.Y., in June 1945, General Johnson was appointed judge advocate of the First Air Force, becoming judge advocate of the Air Defense Command there upon its activation in March 1946, and later staff judge advocate. Receiving his regular commission in the Judge Advocate General's Department in July 1946, General Johnson transferred to the Air Force in November l947. A year later he was named assistant judge advocate general for Civil Law of the U.S. Air Force and in February 1949, assumed the additional duty as chairman, Judicial Council, Office of the Judge Advocate General.
Ordered to the Far East Air Forces at Tokyo, Japan, in March 1953, the general was appointed judge advocate general for FEAF. Joining the Air Training Command on Aug. 1, 1956, General Johnson assumed duties as judge advocate general at ATC headquarters, Scott Air Force Base, Ill., remaining in the same capacity when Training Command headquarters moved to Randolph Air Force Base, Texas on Sept. 3, 1957.
General Johnson has been awarded the Legion of Merit with two oak leaf clusters.
Sources: https://www.af.mil/information/bios/bio.asp?bioID=5953. (No longer available).  Gunboat Justice (Vol 3), Clark, Douglas, Earnshaw Books, 2015 (Re US Court for China)

Johnson in 1943 in Kunming China when serving as Special Judge of the US Court for China

BERTRAND E JOHNSON

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