The last empress: how Puyi’s wife Wanrong befriended her American tutor, Isabel Ingram, in the Forbidden City

China’s final imperial ruler had his British tutor, Reginald Johnston. Less is known about Puyi’s wife Wanrong and her American tutor, Isabel Ingram

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Reginald Johnston, Wanrong and Isabel Ingram in the Forbidden City. The life of China’s final imperial ruler may have been immortalised by way of a Hollywood blockbuster, but less known is that of Puyi’s wife Wanrong and her American tutor Isabel Ingram.

Paul French

Published: 7:15am, 30 Mar 2024Updated: 2:49am, 5 Apr 2024

You may already know the story of Reginald Johnston, the British tutor to the final Dragon Emperor of the Qing dynasty, Aisin-Gioro Puyi.

Even if you haven’t read Johnston’s 1934 memoir, Twilight in the Forbidden City, you might remember him being played by Peter O’Toole in Bernardo Bertolucci’s 1987 film, The Last Emperor.

The Manchu empire had crumbled, the Chinese Republic was still shaky but triumphant, and emperor, tutor and courtiers knew their days in the Forbidden City were numbered.

The relationship between the Edinburgh-born former diplomat and the 13-year-old Puyi began in 1919, with Johnston not only tutoring the boy, but trying to convey to him the world beyond the limited confines of the Forbidden City.

He taught him to ride a bicycle, to use a telephone, and procured him a much-needed pair of spectacles.

Puyi (second row, second right) and Wanrong (second row, second left) at the British Legation in Peking in 1924.

For all this, Johnston earned the deep enmity of the corrupt and venal eunuchs who surrounded Puyi, who stole so much of the imperial treasure, and sought to frustrate the close relationship between tutor and pupil.