BIOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL MEMOIRS OF MISSISSIPPI (Chicago: Goodspeed
Pub. Co., 1891 / Spartanburg, SC: The Reprint Co., 1978), vol. II, pp.
692-693:

Colonel Jephthah Robins

Col. Jephthah Robins has for many years been a most conspicuous and
influential member of the bar of Mississippi, and is worthy of mention
in this record of the men who have been important factors in the
development and cultivation of the resources of the state. He is a
native of Pickens district, S.C., born in 1814, and is a son of Albert
and Susan (Norton) Robins, natives of South Carolina and Virginia
respectively. Albert Robins was a son of Michael Robins, a native of
North Carolina, and a farmer by occupation. When Albert was a mere lad
his father removed to SC The father was one of
a family of eight sons and four daughters. He and all his brothers wer e
soldiers in the Revolutionary war. he lived to the allotted age of man ,
three score and ten years. He reared a family of four sons and four
daughters, all of whom lived to be grown. Albert was next to the
youngest child, and was reared in South Carolina, where he resided unt il
1841. He then came to Fulton, Miss., where he lived at the time of his
death, in 1849; he was seventy-eight years of age. His wife died two
years later at about the same age. She was a consistent member of the
Baptist church. To them were born three children: Levi died in South
Carolina; Mrs. Arminda Copeland died in Fulton, Miss.; the Colonel was
the second born. He passed his youth in South Carolina, and received h is
education in the common schools. When he had reached his twentieth yea r
he went to Moulton, Ala., where he clerked in a dry goods store for on e
year. Thence he went to Fulton, Miss., in 1836, and there he was
employed as a clerk for some time. He then engaged in the mercantile
trade on his own account, and while in this business, he was elected
treasurer of the county of Itawamba. After discharging the duties of
this office for one term he was elected probate clerk for two years. h e
was then made clerk of the chancery court, the district comprising
Itawamba, Monroe, Chickasaw and Tishomingo counties. He held this offi ce
eight years, and during that time he read law, and was admitted to the
bar at Aberdeen, Judge Rogers presiding. He practiced his profession a t
Fulton until 1852, when he came to Lee county, and located at Guntown.
For several years he devoted himself industriously to the law, but of
late years, he has paid more attention to agriculture, and has turned
his practice over to his son, John Quitman Robins, a partner of the Ho n.
John M. Allen. Colonel Robins was attorney for the Mobile & Ohio
railroad, which position brought him many duties, and he still attends
to all legal matters pertaining to the road. He is a man well read in
all points of law and every class of literature. He is aman of rare
judgement, quick insight and keep observation. He has won a wide
reputation and his ability is recognized in all legal circles througho ut
the South. He was married to Eliza D. Allen, a sister of the Hon. J.M.
Allen, a native of Virginia (See sketch of John M. Allen). Nine childr en
were born to this union, one of whom is deceased: Mrs. Belle Gore, Mrs .
Molliue Allen, John Q., Jephthah (deceased), William, James, Edwin,
Annie and Harrison Lamar. The younger children are now attending some o f
the best educational institutions of the South, and all have had
superior advantages in that line. Colonel Robins served on detached du ty
during the late Civil war, and was on intimate terms with Jefferson
Davis, McNutt, Foote, Prentiss and Poindexter. He was a member of the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows at Aberdeen, but the lodge is no long er
in existence. He and his wife are members of the Methodist Episcopal
church. The Colonel is a selfmade man, and is fully deserving of the
honors that have been conferred upon him, and entirely worthy of the
high regard in which he is held in the state.

John German research
Michael Robbins, c1745-c1820, first appears as a second poll with
Richard Robbins in a 1761 tax list of Rowan Co., NC, suggesting Richar d
Robins paid poll tax for himself and Michael Robbins thus giving us ou r
evidence that Michael was Richard's son. Michael was still in Randolph
Co., NC, during the 1779 tax assesments, but he appears to have sided
with the Loyalists during the Revolutionary War and relocated to SC
after that cause was lost [State Records of North Carolina and David
Fannin's memoir].