John Platts (1775–1837) was an English Unitarian minister and author, a compiler of reference works.
He was born in Boston, Lincolnshire. For seven or eight years he officiated as a Calvinist minister there; but later he became a Unitarian, and acted as a Unitarian minister at Boston from 1805 to 1817. In 1817 he moved to Doncaster.
Platts supplemented his ministerial income by teaching and compiling educational works. He was also a Liberal activist, and humorous speaker. He died at Doncaster, after a long illness, on 19 June 1837. His widow died in 1851, leaving five daughters.
In 1825 Platts published five volumes of A New Universal Biography, containing lives of eminent persons in all ages and countries, arranged in chronological order, with alphabetical index. This work, founded mainly on previous works by John Aikin and Alexander Chalmers, extended only to the end of the sixteenth century; the rest remained in manuscript form. In 1827 appeared, Platts's New Self-interpreting Testament, containing many thousands of various Readings and Parallel Passages collected from the most approved Translators and Biblical Critics. In the preface the author claims to have combined the merits of Francis Fox and Clement Cruttwell. Another edition, in 4 vols. appeared in 1830.
Platts also published:
