Queensland State Archives posted a photo:
‘Eucalyptus’ is a combination of Greek words meaning ‘well covered’, in reference to the cap protecting the bud. The name was first published in 1788, the year of English colonisation.
It is likely that Europeans first encountered eucalypts not in Australia, but in the early 16th century when the Portuguese colonised Timor, which has at least two indigenous species. However, the recorded history of Eucalypts begins in 1788, when French botanist Charles Louis L’Hritier de Brutelle described Eucalyptus obliqua (Messmate Stringybark) from specimens collected in 1777. Plant collector David Nelson had collected the specimens at Adventure Bay, Bruny Island, Tasmania during Captain James Cook’s third Pacific expedition with HMS Resolution and Discovery.
Several more species were named and published between 1788 and the beginning of the nineteenth century, mostly by English botanist James Edward Smith. As may be expected, most of these species were trees of the