Robinson Family History

English (Lancashire and Yorkshire): patronymic from the Middle English personal name Robin , a pet form of Robert , + -son. This surname is also very common among African Americans.

French: from a pet form of the personal name Robin .

West Indian (including Haiti) and Guyanese: most likely not (only) of English or French origin as in 1 above and 2 above, but also, if not mostly, from the related name of the famous Daniel Defoe's literary character Robinson Crusoe (from a novel first published in 1719).

History: One of the most famous bearers of this widespread northern English surname was the Puritan preacher John Robinson (c. 1575–1625) of Sturton, Nottinghamshire, England. In 1604 he was removed from his fellowship of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, for his religious views. He was the leader of the group of English Puritans who fled to Leiden in the Netherlands in 1608–9, among whom were many of the Pilgrims who sailed on the Mayflower in 1620. His son Isaac came to Plymouth, MA, in 1631, and eventually settled in Tisbury, Martha's Vineyard, c. 1670.