3 vols. 8vo; 3rd edit. 2 vols. 1872); prefixed is a portrait, at the age of eighty-six, engraved from a photograph by W. Holl, and appended are some vivid recollections of Robinson by Augustus de Morgan. There is a portrait panel, by Edward Armitage, at University Hall, Gordon Square, where there is also a bust, executed by Ewing in Rome about 1831.
[Diary, Reminiscences, and Correspondence of Henry Crabb Robinson, by Dr. Thomas Sadler; Letters of Charles Lamb, ed. Ainger.]
ROBINSON, HERCULES (1789–1864), admiral, born on 16 March 1789, was the eldest son of Christopher Robinson, rector of Granard, co. Longford, by Elizabeth, second daughter of Sir Hercules Langrishe, bart., of Knocktopher, co. Kilkenny. Sir Bryan Robinson [q. v.] was his brother. He entered the navy in June 1800, in the Penelope, with Captain (afterwards Sir Henry) Blackwood [q. v.], with whom he was also in the Euryalus at Trafalgar, and in the Ajax, till moved, in January 1807, to the Ocean flagship of Lord Collingwood in the Mediterranean. Two months later he was appointed to the Glory as acting-lieutenant, in which rank he was confirmed on 25 April 1807. In December he was moved to the Warspite, again with Blackwood, and in 1809 to the Téméraire in the Baltic, from which, on 30 Aug., he was promoted to the command of the Prometheus in the Baltic during 1810, and afterwards in the Atlantic, ranging as far as the Canary Islands, and even the West Indies. The Prometheus was an extremely dull sailer, incapable of improvement, so that any vessel she chased left her hopelessly astern; and it was owing only to the good fortune and judgment of her commander that she managed to pick up some prizes. On 7 June 1814 Robinson was advanced to post rank. From September 1817 to the end of 1820 he commanded the Favourite on the Cape of Good Hope and St. Helena station, and afterwards on the east coast of South America. In 1820 he was at Newfoundland, and was appointed by the commander-in-chief to regulate the fishery of the coast of Labrador, which he did with tact, temper, and judgment. He had no further service afloat, and in 1846 accepted the retirement, becoming in due course rear-admiral on 9 Oct. 1849, vice-admiral on 21 Oct. 1856, and admiral on 15 Jan. 1862. In 1842 he was sheriff of Westmeath. In 1856 he made a yachting voyage to the Salvages, a group of barren rocks midway between Madeira and the Canaries, on one of which a vast treasure, the spoil of a Spanish galleon, was said to be buried. When in the Prometheus Robinson had been sent to look for this treasure, but met with no success. A further search was rather the excuse than the reason for revisiting the islets in the yacht, but the voyage gave him an opportunity of writing ‘Seadrift,’ a small volume of reminiscences (8vo, 1858, with portrait). He died at Southsea on 15 May 1864. He married, in 1822, Frances Elizabeth, only child of Henry Widman Wood of Rosmead, Westmeath, and had issue six sons, of whom Sir Hercules George Robert Robinson [q. v.] (1824–1897), administrator in South Africa, was created Lord Rosmead in 1896.
[O'Byrne's Naval Biogr. Dict.; Gent. Mag. 1864, i. 814; Foster's Baronetage, s.n. Langrishe; Navy Lists.]
ROBINSON, HUGH (1584?–1655), archdeacon of Gloucester, born in Anglesea about 1584, was a son of Nicholas Robinson (d. 1585) [q. v.], bishop of Bangor (Wood, Athenæ Oxon. ii. 798). He was admitted to Winchester School in 1596 (Kirby, Winchester Scholars, p. 157), and matriculated at New College, Oxford, on 16 Dec. 1603 (Clark, Oxford Registers). In 1605 he was elected perpetual fellow, and held his fellowship till 1614. He graduated B.A. on 21 April 1607, M.A. 23 Jan. 1610–11, B.D. and D.D. on 21 June 1627. He was chief master of Winchester School from 1613 to 1627 (Kirby, ubi supra, p. 165), and became successively rector of Llanbedr, with the vicarage of Caerhun in 1613; of Trêvriw (Carnarvon) in 1618; of Bighton, Hampshire, in 1622; of Shabbington, Buckinghamshire; canon of Lincoln on 24 Feb. 1624–5 (Le Neve, Fasti); archdeacon of Gloucester on 5 June 1634 (ib.) He was rector of Dursley from 1625 to 1647. In his archdeaconry he seems to have been moderate in his proceedings (Cal. State Papers, Dom. ccclxxviii. No. 14).
During the civil war he lost his canonry and archdeaconry, was seized at his living at Dursley and ill-treated; but he took the covenant, wrote in defence of it, and accepted the living of Hinton, near Winchester, from the parliament (Walker, Sufferings of the Clergy, i. 33; Addit. MS. 15671, f. 6). He died on 30 March 1655, and was buried on the following 18 April in the chancel of St. Giles-in-the-Fields, London.
He wrote:
- An 8vo volume, published in Oxford in 1616, containing ‘Preces’ for the use of Winchester School, in Latin and English, ‘Grammaticalia Quædam,’ in Latin and English, and ‘Antiquæ Historiæ Synopsis.’
- ‘Scholæ Wintoniensis Phrases Latinæ,’ London, 1654; 2nd edit. by his son Nicholas,
