Sir John Beverley Robinson: Bone and Sinew of the Compact

John Beverley Robinson (1791–1863) was one of Upper Canada’s foremost jurists, a dominating influence on the ruling élite, and a leading citizen of nineteenth-century Toronto who owned a vast tract of land on which Osgoode Hall now stands.

The loyalists had founded a colony firm in its devotion to the Crown, with little room for dissent. As a true loyalist son, educated by John Strachan, Robinson attempted to steer Upper Canada toward emulation of what he perceived to be Britain’s idea…