Robertson, John J.

(1796-Oct. 5, 1881). Missionary to Greece. He was born in New York City. After study at the Virginia Theological Seminary, Robertson was ordained deacon on Dec. 10, 1820. He was ordained priest the next year, and then became president of Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont. Robertson later became the president of Oglethorpe University in Atlanta, Georgia. On Dec. 31, 1828, he sailed for Greece on his own initiative. He had convinced the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society to appoint him as an agent to inquire into the state of religion in Greece and to see if the people there might be interested in receiving Episcopal missionaries. He returned to the United States in Dec. 1829 and persuaded the Board of the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society to send a mission to Greece. This mission was not to convert the Greeks but to provide opportunities for education which subjection under the Turks and poverty had prevented. The society appointed Robertson and his wife; the Rev. John H. Hill and his wife, Frances Maria; and Solomon Bingham, a printer, as missionaries to Greece. Robertson served as missionary to Greece until 1842, when he returned to the United States and became rector of St. Luke's Church, Mattawan, New York. In 1858 he became the rector of Trinity Church, Saugerties, New York, where he remained until his retirement in 1879. Robertson died in Saugerties. See Hill, Frances Maria Mulligan.