Enter St John's Churchyard, near Newcastle Central railway station, and you will find towards the rear an inscribed monument which covers the grave of the pastoral poet John Cunningham (1729-1773).
St John's Churchyard was noted for its 'poets' corner'. Unfortunately, apart from John Cunningham their memorial stones are now missing. They include two contemporaries to Robert Gilchrist - William Watson (1796 - 1840) whose many songs included 'Dance to the Daddy', and timber merchant and songwriter Thomas Thompson (1773-1816), who was a mentor to Robert. Gilchrist composed a sentimental eulogy to Thompson upon his death in 1816.
Gilchrist wrote a number of eulogies to Newcastle's poets and civic dignataries and a fine one to Cunningham was published in Robert's Poems of 1826. It reads:
