Background
Born the son of Henry Hutt Cunningham QC and Elizabeth Mary Cunningham (née Park), Cunningham was educated at Stubbington House School.
Born the son of Henry Hutt Cunningham QC and Elizabeth Mary Cunningham (née Park), Cunningham was educated at Stubbington House School.
Cunningham was educated at Stubbington House School. He joined the Royal Navy as a cadet in the training ship HMS Britannia in January 1900 and was posted as a midshipman to the cruiser HMS Gibraltar on the Cape of Good Hope Station in June 1901.
In June 1939 he was promoted to vice admiral and went to the Mediterranean as commander of the first cruiser squadron. This reinforced the Home Fleet when war broke out. Cunningham’s squadron supported Carton de Viart in Norway, took King Haakon Vll and his party from Andalsnes to Tromso and on to Britain.
The admiral was co-commander, with Maj Gen N. M. S. Irwin, of De Gualle’s hapless attempt to take Dakar, 23-25 September 1940. Early the next year he began a gruelling tour of more than two years as fourth sea lord (supplies and transport).
Sir John (KCB in 1941) was appointed CinC Levant in June 1943. The separate naval command was set up to comprise the eastern Mediterranean after the Tunisian campaign ended. Sir John was an acting admiral for two months in this post before getting the actual rank. He also was deputy to Andrew Cunningham (no kin), whom he succeeded in October 1943 as Allied CinC Mediterranean. Sir John succeeded ABC in May 1946 as first sea lord and CNS. The namesakes were quite different. Sir John being somewhat of an intellectual and a dour, sarcastic, hard-nosed man who seldom praised subordinates. (DNB.) He was promoted to fleet admiral in Jan 48 and retired the following September to spend the next 10 years as chairman of the Iraq Petroleum Co. The admiral died 13 December 1962 in the Middlesex Hospital.
On 8 March 1910 Cunningham married his first cousin, Dorothy May. He had spent some of his early years in Ulverston with Dorothy, after his parents had both died at sea. They had two sons.