John Oswald (revolutionary)

John Oswald (c. 1760 – 14 September 1793) was a Scottish philosopher and revolutionary. Initially a British Army officer, he became disillusioned with colonialism while serving in India and adopted vegetarianism after living among Hindu communities. On returning to Britain, he became involved in radical literary and political circles in London, contributing to journals and publishing works advocating republicanism, direct democracy, atheism, animal rights, and vegetarianism.

Oswald moved to Paris in 1790, where he joined the Jacobin Club, edited revolutionary newspapers, and became a commander in the French Revolutionary Army. He was killed in action during the War in the Vendée in 1793. His best-known work, The Cry of Nature; or, an Appeal to Mercy and Justice on Behalf of the Persecuted Animals (1791), presents a political and ethical critique of meat consumption and is regarded as an early text in the Western tradition of animal rights and vegetarian philosophy.