John Berkenhout (8 July 1726 – 3 April 1791) was an English physician, naturalist and miscellaneous writer.

[1] Berkenhout became a cadet in a Prussian infantry regiment, where he was promoted to the rank of ensign and then captain.

In 1756, at the start of the Seven Years' War, he left the Prussian service, and received a commission in an English regiment.

On his return to England he settled at Isleworth in Middlesex, It is stated in David Elisha Davy's 'Suffolk Collections' (xc.

Suspicion arose in September that he was corrupting leading citizens; and he was detained and questioned, and thrown into prison.

[2][3] In the end Berkenhout was paroled, and rejoined the commissioners at New York on 19 September; but the negotiations of the Carlisle Commission were dead.

Berkenhout's major work was Biographia Literaria, or a Biographical History of Literature, containing the lives of English, Scotch, and Irish authors, from the dawn of letters in these kingdoms to the present time, chronologically and classically arranged (1777, first volume only).

[1] Steevens in fact used the work to put into circulation one of his hoaxes, a forged letter purporting to be from George Peele.

[5] In 1780 Berkenhout published Lucubrations on Ways and Means, a proposal on the imposition of taxes.

[1] Berkenhout also published Treatise on Hysterical and Hypochondriacal Diseases (1777), from the French of Pierre Pomme.