John H. Smythe (July 14, 1844 – September 5, 1908) was the United States ambassador to Liberia from 1878 to 1881 and from 1882 to 1885. Before his appointment, he had various clerkships in the federal government in Washington, DC and in Wilmington, North Carolina. Later in his life he took part in a number of leading African American organizations and was president of a Reformatory School outside of Richmond, Virginia.