The ever-growing demands of the foreigners for concessions in China were greatly resented by the Chinese people and provided a fillip to the anti-foreigners feeling in the country. This culminated in a number of outrages against the foreigners in different parts of the country. But the western powers desisted from taking any effective action against China due to their pre-occupations elsewhere.
In 1856, the things assumed serious dimension following the boarding of the Canton police on a small vessel Lorclia Arrow registered in British Hongkong and arrest of twelve members of the crew on the charge of smuggling and piracy. As the ship was flying the British flag, the British Captain demanded the return of the crew.
After some hesitation Yeh returned the crew. However, the English Captain was furious because Yeh had not tendered proper apologies. Therefore, he sent three <gun boats along the river Canton to .shell the city.
This enraged the Cantonese and they attacked the foreign settlement outside the city walls and sacked it completely. In view of these developments the British decided to send a full-scale expedition. The French, who nourished a grievance against the Chinese for having sentenced one of their missionaries (Abbe Chapadelaine) offered to collaborate with the Britain.
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Thereupon Britain and France despatched a joint expedition. This expedition met with decisive success. The joint forces captured Canton. They captured anti-foreign Viceroy and High Commissioner Yeh and exiled him to Calcutta.
As the Chinese still proved obdurate, the French and the English fleets carried the war to the north and captured the forts commanding the entrance to Tientstin. In view of the direct threat to the capital by this success of joint forces, the Chinese government sued for peace and negotiations started in Tienstin.
These negotiations demonstrated the complete incompetence of the Chinese because the demands put forward by the French and the English were accepted by the Chinese under the threat of renewed hostilities. The American and the Russian representatives also tried to take maximum advantage of the helpless position of the Chinese.
Thus despite their mutual rivalries the western powers made a common front against China and exerted pressure on her to concede their demands. One demand of the western powers which was firmly turned down by the Chinese despite threat of renewed hostilities related to the establishment of permanent embassies at Peking. However, ultimately a compromise was made whereby the allied representatives agreed that envoys should be sent only from time to time.
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In 1859 the French, British and American envoys demanded the Chinese Emperor to receive them in Peking for exchange of ratified documents of the treaties of 1858, as envisaged in these treaties. The Chinese Emperor agreed to receive them but insisted that the envoys should follow a route which was followed by the tribute-bearing embassies from subordinate princes in the Far East.
The British and the French envoys refused to accede to this demand and renewed the war. This greatly surprised the Peking. The hostilities were brought to close by Supplementary Conventions signed in Peking in 1860.