Subscribe to the BOA podcast here

Episode Notes

John Ross speaks with English travel writer and photographer David Leffman about his new book, A Murder in Yunnan: The Unsolved Killing of a British Diplomat on China’s Southwestern Frontier. The conversation begins with David’s own long engagement with China, which started with a difficult first trip in 1985, and then continued a decade later with work on The Rough Guide to China.

In the 1860s, the British dreamed of opening a profitable overland trade route into China from British India via Burma. The 1868 Sladen Expedition scouted a route from Bhamo in Burma to Tengyue/Tengchong in Yunnan, China. The going was difficult because the southwestern frontier area had been devastated by prolonged Muslim uprisings and banditry. The Browne Expedition tried again in 1875. Augustus Raymond Margary, a young British diplomat and gifted Chinese speaker, joined this second expedition after making a remarkable overland journey from Shanghai across the breadth of China. But tragedy soon struck.

Margary’s murder near the border – what became known as the Margary Affair – turned into a diplomatic crisis, nearly provoking a third Anglo-Chinese war. This BOA episode contains no spoilers; David doesn’t reveal who he thinks killed the young Englishman, but we do run through some of the many suspects and look at the fallout from this true crime case. And, as icing on the cake, we even hear about a Burmese mission to Peking with elephants as tribute.

A Murder in Yunnan is published by the Hong Kong-based Blacksmith Books. It’s due out April 7, 2026 but can be preordered now.

To learn more about David Leffman’s writing, visit his website.

John has written reviews for Bookish Asia of David’s earlier China books.

The Mercenary Mandarin: How a British adventurer became a general in Qing-dynasty China. John also did a related author interview with David for this book.

Paper Horses: Woodblock Prints of Gods from Northern China