The sequel to "Limehouse Nights" presents more stories set in London's Chinatown. Thomas Burke was born Sydney Thomas Burke on 29 November 1886 in Clapham, a southern suburb of London that by the turn of the century had fallen out of favour with the middle-classes. Burke's father died when he was barely a few months old and he was eventually sent to live with his uncle in Poplar. At the age of ten he was removed to a home for middle class boys who were "[r]espectably descended but without adequate means to their support." When Burke turned sixteen he started working as an office boy, a job that he deeply detested. In 1901, he published his first professional written work entitled "The Bellamy Diamonds" in the magazine Spare Moments. He also edited some anthologies of children's poetry that were published in 1910–1913