First found in Yorkshire, where a John Richard Robunson was on record in 1324 in the Court Rolls of the manor of Wakefield, and a Thomas Robynson was listed in the Yorkshire Poll Tax returns of 1379.

Families began migrating abroad in enormous numbers because of the political and religious discontent in England. Often faced with persecution and starvation in England, the possibilities of the New World attracted many English people. Although the ocean trips took many lives, those who did get to North America were instrumental in building the necessary groundwork for what would become for new powerful nations. Among the first immigrants of the name Robinson, or a variant listed above to cross the Atlantic and come to North America were : John Robinson, who immigrated to Virginia in 1606; Isaac and Bridget Robinson, who arrived in Plymouth in 1629; Alister, Charles, James, and Daniel Robinson, who all settled in Boston in 1651.

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