Arthur Michael Robinson died with his wife in a fire at his home at Loxwood, Sussex, on 28th June, 1948. He was 55 years of age.
He was educated at Giggleswick School in Yorkshire from 1907 to 1911 and then entered the Royal School of Mines as a mining student. On the outbreak of war he interrupted his studies to join H.M. Forces and served with the 4th East Lanes. Regt. at Gallipoli and in Egypt and France, and from August, 1917, was attached to the 179 Tunnelling Company, R.E., and during his service in France was badly gassed. He was sent to India and held the position of adjutant to the 82nd Punjubis Regt. He was demobilized in 1919 with the rank of captain, and returned to complete his professional training at the Royal School of Mines, obtaining the A.R.S.M. and the D.I.C. in 1920.
In September, 1920, he took up a post at the Allihies copper mines, Co. Cork, but had to give it up after a few months owing to heart trouble due to his war service, and from 1921 to 1924 worked as an engineer at the Palmer Foundry Co., Ltd., London. In September, 1924, he was appointed surveyor, sampler, and general assistant to the manager at the lead-zinc mines of the Russo-Asiatic Corporation (later Mining Trust, Ltd.), at Villemagne, France, and two years later became manager of their lead-zinc mines at St. Sebastion in France.
Towards the end of 1930 Mr. Robinson was transferred by Mining Trust, Ltd., to their property at Wau, New Guinea, where he held the position of assistant manager of New Guinea Goldfields, Ltd., for a short time. He was working as a consultant in London from 1930 to 1933, and was then appointed general manager of Gold Coast Banket Areas, Ltd., in West Africa, in February, 1934, also becoming general manager of South Banket Areas, Ltd, and in 1935 being made consulting mining engineer to Amalgamated Banket Areas, Ltd. He was consulting mining engineer to the first two companies from 1937 to 1943, and then took up a post in the Ministry of Works and Planning at Nottingham.
He subsequently became Assistant Director of Opencast Coal Production, Ministry of Supply, and in March, 1946, left to accept the appointment of mining consulting to the Government of Tanganyika Territory. He still held this position at the time of his death and had returned on leave to his Sussex home with his wife when the tragedy occurred.
Mr. Robinson was the author, with Mr. G.V. Hobson, of a paper entitled ‘The Gold Coast Banket: some aspects of its geology in relation to mining’ which was published in the Transactions (vol. 52, 1942-43).
He was elected to Studentship of the Institution in 1913 and was transferred to Associateship in 1922 and to Membership in 1935.
Vol. 58, Trans I.M.M., 1948-9, pp.592-3
