Major-General Sir John Clayton Cowell PC KCB (14 January 1832 – 29 August 1894) was a British Army officer and later Master of the Queen's Household and lieutenant-governor of Windsor Castle.
In 1850 he joined the Royal Engineers, he served with the Baltic fleet and at Crimea, where he was aide-de-camp to General Sir Harry Jones[2] and where he wounded himself on 10 August 1854 by accidentally discharging a revolver he had borrowed from Bartholomew Sulivan.
Clayton returned to England and from 1856 to 1866 he became governor to the young Prince Alfred, who in 1866 became the Duke of Edinburgh.
[2] In 1866 Clayton was appointed as Master of the Queen's Household and he retired from the Army in 1879 with the honorary rank of major-general.
Queen Victoria was godmother to their eldest son, Albert Victor John (born 12 June 1869).