An American journalist named Bayard Taylor was in Shanghai in 1853 when Perry stopped there on his way to Japan. Taylor enlisted in the U.S. Navy so that he cou

An American journalist named Bayard Taylor was in Shanghai in 1853 when Perry stopped there on his way to Japan. Taylor enlisted in the U.S. Navy so that he could join Perry’s expedition as a clerk [1], and the notes he kept were later incorporated into the official U.S. report of the expedition [2]. Taylor’s own later account of their arrival in Japan makes good reading [3]. More Western writing about Japan in the 19th and early 20th centuries is collected in my Japan As They Saw It [4]. [1] https://archive.org/details/cu31924031232360/page/360/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/cu31924031232360/page/360/mode/2... [2] https://archive.org/details/narrativeofexped00perr/page/n5/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/narrativeofexped00perr/page/n5/m... [3] https://archive.org/details/cu31924031232360/page/410/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/cu31924031232360/page/410/mode/2... [4] https://www.gally.net/jatsi/index.html https://www.gally.net/jatsi/index.html