Tennent, Robert (1765–1837), medical doctor, merchant, and philanthropist, was born 9 August 1765, fourth child and second son (of five) of the Rev. John Tennent and Anne Tennent (née Patton). One brother died young in the West Indies in 1794. After completing his medical studies, Robert Tennent too went to work in the West Indies (he had at one stage been offered, but probably refused, the post of physician on a slave ship). Finding himself unable to practise there as a doctor, he worked for several years as a property agent in Jamaica. After the outbreak of war between Great Britain and France, in June 1793 he joined the Royal Navy as a surgeon, serving in the Europe. He remained in the navy until early in 1799, when, after the arrest of his brother William (qv) as a United Irishman, he resigned his post and settled in Belfast. During his brother's imprisonment in Fort George, Robert looked after his business interests, becoming a partner in the Sugar House himself for a time; in fact he was so occupied with business that he seldom practised his profession.
Like William, he played an active part, on the liberal side, in the social life of Belfast, notably in charitable causes. He was for many years treasurer of the Belfast General Hospital, served on the Pipe Water committee of the Charitable Society, and was a spring water commissioner (until 1840 the Society was responsible for supplying the town of Belfast with its public water supply). Tennent's public activities were strongly motivated by his religious beliefs as a devout Calvinist; his active membership of the Hibernian Bible Society was a direct expression of this. Like other radicals of the period in Belfast, including his brother William, he was interested in Irish culture and was one of the founders of the Harp Society. Started in 1808, at a meeting where he and two other doctors drew up the rules, the Society arranged not only harp lessons but classes for the learning of Irish.
In 1813 Tennent's radicalism twice drew him into confrontation with the local tory establishment, which clustered around Lord Donegall (qv) and the corporation of Belfast that he and his wife's family, the Mays, controlled. In the first instance, a Twelfth of July march led to the shooting, by Orange supporters, of two people in a hostile crowd. When the five accused of these murders were tried, three were acquitted and the two judged guilty (of manslaughter) were sentenced to only six months in prison. Liberals, Tennent among them, outraged both by the march and by its outcome, forced the sovereign (mayor), Thomas Verner, brother-in-law of Lady Donegall, and one of a notable Orange family, to call a town meeting. After some heated argument at this assembly, Robert Tennent was accused by the Rev. Edward May – vicar of Belfast, brother of Lady Donegall, agent of the Donegall estate, and a magistrate – of having assaulted him. Tennent was arrested and lodged in the town gaol (known as the Black Hole). While on bail awaiting trial, he was approached for advice by the husband of a pedlar named Jane Barnes, who claimed that Sovereign Verner had assaulted and attempted to rape her in the grounds of his house when she called there to sell her wares. Unwisely, Tennent played some role in encouraging the prosecution of Verner at the Down county assizes, where the accused was acquitted by his fellow magistrates and jurors. When Tennent's own trial took place shortly afterwards, before a bench that included Thomas Verner, his opponents made good use of his alleged role in the earlier case to prejudice the jury against him. And when he was found guilty of assaulting May, he was not only fined £50 but also imprisoned for three months – an outrageous sentence in the circumstances.
Incidentally Samuel Tennent, born in 1799 and youngest of the five Tennent brothers, was also involved in the civic controversies of 1813. An obscure figure – no record of his death, if in Belfast, is known – he too was evidently a radical. He played some part in the anti-Orange fracas of 12 July and in consequence was dodging a bench warrant at the time of the town meeting.
Robert Tennent married Eliza McCrone, who died about 1803; he himself died 9 January 1837. Their son, Robert James, who married a niece of the United Irishman Henry Joy McCracken (qv), was liberal MP for Belfast 1840–52. There is a portrait of Tennent c.1815, by an unknown artist, in the Ulster Museum.