His index entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography is short and to the point…

Backhouse, Sir Edmund Trelawny, second baronet (1873–1944), Sinologist and fraudster

Born in 1873, the son of a banker, Edmund Trelawny Backhouse arrived in China in 1899. He soon hooked up with George Ernes Morrison, correspondent for the Times. First he worked as a translator – he knew Russian, Japanese and Chinese, Manchu and Mongolian – and later as a provider of insider information from the Chinese Imperial Court – him being a close friend of the Grand Councilor Wang Wen-shao, the Grand Eunuch Li Lien-ying, Viceroy Hsü Shih-ch’ang, Prime Minister Tuan Ch’i-jui, Finance Minister Liang Shih-i, etcetera.
The only problem being, of course, that he had no contacts whatsoever in court.
He was making things up. Continue reading →