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lexington and concord
During the wee hours of April 19, 1775, he would send out regiments of British soldiers quartered in Boston. Their destinations were Lexington, where they would capture Colonial leaders Sam Adams and John Hancock, then Concord, where they would seize gunpowder.But spies and friends of the Americans leaked word of Gage's plan.Two lanterns hanging from Boston's North Church informed the countryside that the British were going to attack by sea. A series of horseback riders — men such as Paul Rever -
bunker hil and breeds hill
On the night of June 16, 1775, a detail of American troops acting under orders from Artemas Ward moved out of their camp, carrying picks, shovels, and guns. They entrenched themselves on a rise located on Charleston Peninsula overlooking Boston. Their destination: Bunker Hill.From this hill, the rebels could bombard the town and British ships in Boston Harbor. But Ward's men misunderstood his orders. They went to Breed's Hill by mistake and entrenched themselves there closer to the British -
trenton and princeton
General George Washington's army crossed the icy Delaware on Christmas Day 1776 and, over the course of the next 10 days, won two crucial battles of the American Revolution. In the Battle of Trenton (December 26), Washington defeated a formidable garrison of Hessian mercenaries before withdrawing. A week later he returned to Trenton to lure British forces south, then executed a daring night march to capture Princeton on January 3. -
battle of saratoga
The Battle of Saratoga was the turning point of the Revolutionary War.The scope of the victory is made clear by a few key facts: On October 17, 1777, 5,895 British and Hessian troops surrendered their arms. General John Burgoyne had lost 86 percent of his expeditionary force that had triumphantly marched into New York from Canada in the early summer of 1777. -
winter at valley forge
For his winter encampment, Washington selected Valley Forge on the Schuylkill River approximately 20 miles northwest of Philadelphia. With its high ground and position near the river, Valley Forge was easily defensible, but still close enough to the city for Washington to maintain pressure on the British. Despite the defeats of the fall, the 12,000 men of the Continental Army were in good spirits when they marched into Valley Forge on December 19, 1777. -
yorktown battle
When Washington reached Virginia, Americans led by Lafayette joined in the siege. The French navy kept the British out of Chesapeake Bay until Cornwallis was forced to surrender his entire unit of nearly 8,000 troops on October 19, 1781. The capture of the troops severely hampered the British war effort -
the treaty of paris 1783
The talks began in April 1782, after the American-French victory at Yorktown led to the toppling of Lord North's Tory government and the naming of a Whig, Lord Rockingham, as prime minister and Lord Shelburne as foreign minister. The Continental Congress named a five-member commission to negotiate a treaty--John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, John Jay, Thomas Jefferson, and Henry Laurens. Laurens, however, was captured by a British warship and held in the Tower of London until the end of the war
