I. Peace or war: The Times

The general public in Britain first heard about the Arrow quarrel on Monday 29 December 1856 through a telegraphic despatch from Trieste. On New Year's Day, the overland mail arrived. At once The Times published a second edition and printed a summary of a report from their correspondent in Hong Kong. The next day, The Times reproduced the entire report detailing events up to 15 November 1856. On 6 January 1857, the British government published in the London Gazette Admiral Sir Michael Seymour's despatch to the Admiralty, with enclosures, about the operations of the Royal Navy in the Canton River, the destruction of Chinese forts, and the bombardment of Canton.

How did the British press react to the news of this undeclared war? The Times editorial of 2 January 1857, that is, the same day on which The Times printed in full the report from its own correspondent in the Far East, is noteworthy. The editor warned the nation that to tolerate Yeh's behaviour would be entirely to forfeit the position already acquired by the Opium War (1839–42) and to present Britons to the Chinese as a nation devoid of honour and self-respect. It argued that Yeh's refusal to receive Her Majesty's representative was in itself the termination of friendly relations and an advertisement that the Treaty of Nanking, as far as Canton was concerned, was virtually at an end.