Richard Parkinson (1797–1858) was an English clergyman, known as a canon of Manchester Cathedral, college principal, theologian and antiquarian.

The son of John Parkinson, by his wife Margaret Blackburne, he was born at Woodgates, Admarsh, near Lancaster, on 17 September 1797.

He was educated at the grammar schools of Chipping, Hawkstead, and Sedbergh, and at St John's College, Cambridge, where he matriculated in December 1815.

In 1833 he preached at Bishop Charles Sumner's visitation at Manchester; and he was elected (on 20 May 1833) as fellow of the collegiate chapter.

He was a liberal donor to church objects, and gave towards the cost of rebuilding the vicarage-house and the old conventual abbey of St Bees.

He obtained the Seatonian prize at Cambridge in 1830 for his poem on the Ascent of Elijah, ahead of Winthrop Mackworth Praed and others.