Singleton, Robert Corbet (1810–81), clergyman, classical scholar, and hymn-writer, was born 9 October 1810 in Dublin, second son of Francis Corbet, gentleman, of Dublin and Aclare, Co. Meath, and his wife, Frances (d. 1860), daughter of Joseph Deane, MP, of Terenure, Co. Dublin. His father adopted the form ‘Corbet Singleton’ as the family name in 1820. Robert was educated in England by a private tutor and on 1 January 1827 entered TCD, where he proved himself an excellent classical scholar, and graduated BA (1830) and MA (1833). Ordained a priest, he was appointed the first warden of St Columba's College in Rathfarnham, Co. Dublin, which was founded in 1843. While working at St Columba's he published his first book, The psalter arranged for chanting (1846), while also publishing some sermons in pamphlet form. He resigned from St Columba's in protest at the relaxation of rules requiring the observance of religious fasts.
In 1847 he was appointed the first warden of St Peter's College, Radley, where he immediately instituted a disciplinary system of the most severe kind. Admitted ad eundem to Trinity College, Oxford, in February 1847, he later published Uncleanness: the ruin of body and soul (1850). He resigned from Radley in 1851 and devoted the rest of his life to classical scholarship and hymn-writing. Later publications included The works of Virgil (2 vols, 1855, 1859), which was published in a revised edition in 1871. In 1868 he edited, with E. G. Monk, The anglican hymn-book, which contained twenty-eight hymns of his own composition and many others that he translated from Latin and German; a second edition was published in 1871.
He died at York 7 February 1881 and his remains were returned to Dublin and buried in St. Patrick's cathedral. He never married.