Desmond Parsons

Desmond Edward Parsons FRAS (13 December 1910 – 4 July 1937) was a British aristocrat, amateur sinologist, and aesthete, regarded as "one of the most magnetic men of his generation.

[3][4] In 1934, Desmond Parsons, a brilliant linguist, went to China to reach his friend, and possible lover, Harold Acton who was in Beijing lecturing at the Peking National University.

[7] His brother, who was visiting him, managed to bring back Parsons to Europe where he died on 4 July 1937.

[1] At the beginning of the World War II, Acton sent back to Birr Castle Parsons' collection of Chinese Art.

[3] The journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, of which he had become a resident member in the year of his death,[8] honoured him with an obituary noting his "unusual capacity for observation" and "fine scholarly instinct" as well as "charming personality and transparent honesty of purpose".