Walter Niel Gunson, known Niel Gunson, was a pioneering historian of the Pacific who completed his PHD at the Australian National University in Professor Jim Davidson’s Department of Pacific History, 1955-1958. He was born and raised in Gippsland, Victoria. He was a Fellow in the Department of Pacific and Asian History, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, 1962-1993, and held a visiting fellowship after retiring in 1993.

Gunson is recognised for his ethnographic research in the history of Protestant missions to the Pacific Islands and Polynesia in the 19th century. His later research focused on genealogy and kinship studies in the Pacific. His other interests included European, Australian Indigenous and local history. He owned a large library and archive collection which he shared with others.

Gunson mentored at least 20 PHD scholars. The Journal of Pacific History created the Gunson Prize in 2012 for scholars researching Pacific history. He was a foundational member of The Journal of Pacific History, and in 1975 helped establish the journal Aboriginal History. He worked for the Pacific Manuscripts Bureau. He established the first Tongan history workshop at the ANU in 1987 which resulted in the formation of the Tongan History Association (currently the Tonga Research Association) in 1989.