The first Protestant missionary and ordained representative of Anglican Communion to reach Japan, together with his seminary classmate Channing Moore Williams, he helped found the Nippon Sei Ko Kai.

In November of the same year, they sailed for China around South America, the ship stopping in Rio de Janeiro to repair damage, and Sydney, Australia to reprovision.

[2] Liggins arrived in Shanghai on June 28, 1856, and attended morning prayer in Chinese the next day (a Sunday) at the Church of Our Saviour,[3] which Boone had established (together with a boarding school).

[4] Soon, Liggins and the others began to preach, including on boat journeys outside Shanghai, especially after Keith and his wife returned to Hawaii for health reasons later in the year.

Its leader proclaimed himself as the younger brother of Jesus Christ fought the ruling Manchus (whom he portrayed as devils), and also preached about the equality of women, communal ownership, and revitalized ethics.

[5] Nonetheless, they both traveled (together with their Chinese teacher Mr. Wong whom Nelson had converted) toward Changshu (Dzang Zok), a city of about 100,000 people, about 70 miles northwest of Shanghai in February 1858.

They preached, including on Chinese New Year's Day, and confirmed Nelson's suggestion that it might be a good place to establish a mission, and accordingly wrote Boone for permission in May.

Religious texts could not be openly distributed, but the sale of academic publications afforded Liggins and Williams some engagement with eager Japanese purchasers on matters relating to Christian teaching.

In October 1859 Presbyterian missionaries Dr. and Mrs. James Curtis Hepburn also arrived in Nagasaki from Shanghai, but chose to continue by boat, eventually settling in Kanagawa.

Liggins retired to Cape May, New Jersey where he spent the remaining years of his life, and was recorded in the 1900 and 1910 census as a bachelor living in a boarding house.

[12][non-primary source needed] He was a regular contributor to the letters page of the New York Times, such as his letter defending New York bishop Henry C. Potter (son of bishop Alonzo Potter who had confirmed him), who though abstaining from alcohol, recognized that the saloon had become a poor man's clubhouse because temperance societies did not provide attractive places where intoxicating drinks were not sold.