Warialda Visitor Information Centre presents:
His journey through the Gwydir and Inverell Shires
CUNNINGHAM, ALLAN (1791-1839), botanist and explorer, was born on 13 July 1791 at Wimbledon, Surrey, England, elder son of Allan Cunningham of Renfrewshire, Scotland, and an English mother, née Dickin. He was educated at a private school in Putney and worked for a time in a conveyance’s office in Lincoln's Inn, but the law was not to his liking and in 1808 he accepted a position at the herbarium at Kew as clerk to the curator of the Royal Gardens, William T. Aiton (1766-1849), then completing work on the second edition of his father's Hortus Kewensis. At Kew Cunningham met Robert Brown, who had been botanist in the Investigator with Matthew Flinders and then librarian to Sir Joseph Banks, and on Banks’ recommendation was appointed a botanical collector to the Royal Gardens. On 29 October 1814 Cunningham sailed with James Bowie in H.M.S. Duncan for Rio de Janeiro to collect specimens in Brazil, where they remained for two years. Bowie was then ordered to the Cape of Good Hope and Cunningham to New South Wales.
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