Jones was the man most responsible for popularizing the art of ice-skating. His book A Treatise on Skating was the first published in London in 1772, possibly in more than one edition, with several new reissues down to 1855.

Skates manufactured to Jones' design could be brought at Riccard's Manifactury in London. He was one of the first people to advocate the firm attachment of the skates to the shoes by means of srews through the heels rather than by means of straps and clips.

Though called Captain Jones, he was actually a lieutenant in the artillery corps of the army. In 1772 he was convicted at the Old Bailey for sodomy upon Francis Henry Hay, aged 13. The newspapers debated his guilt or innocence, as he was a popular character; his famous Treatise on Skating was published during the course of his trial.

He was sentenced to death, but on the day he was scheduled to be hanged, this was respited to imprisonment, and one month later he was granted a pardon by king George III on condition he go into exile. A newspaper reported in June 1773 that "the famous Capt. Jones lives now in grandeur with a lovely Ganymede (his footboy) at Lyons, in the South of France".

The following satiric epitaph was printed in a contemporary newspaper in July 1773.

Underneath this stone there lies
A face turn'd downward to the skies;
A captain who employ'd his parts
Upon male b---s [bums?], not female hearts:
Who turn'd his arms not against foes,
But against friends, whence Sodom rose,
And vile Gomorrah horrid fell,
To court th' unnatural flames of hell,
Because he err'd from nature's ways,
Nature despis'd him all his days,
Till being to Jack Ketch [i.e. the hangman] consign'd,
For crime of crimes, and dirty mind,
He was repriev'd from gallows death,
At Tyburn had resign'd his breath;
But George, in vengeance, let him live,
Like Cain, till conscience should forgive.

Source: excerpts from: Aldrich R. & Wotherspoon G., Who's Who in Gay and Lesbian History, from Antiquity to WWII, Routledge, London, 2001

The epitaph is from: Rictor Norton (Ed.), "The Latin Epitaph on Bob Jones, July 1773", Homosexuality in Eighteenth-Century England: A Sourcebook. At: http://www.infopt.demon.co.uk/jones.htm