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As the leaves were just changing color in October of 1774, the colonies were experiencing a lot of trouble because of unfair taxtation. Lack of representation in the British Parliament. And the restriction of colonial freedoms ; even so, less then one-third of the colonists really wanted independence from Britain.
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Early in the next year, in 1775, the situation grew worse when the king declared the colony of Massachusetts to be in open rebellion and commanded that Boston's main patriot leaders Samuel Adams and John Hancock be arrested for treason. A short time later, soldiers were ordered to seize American weapons and gunpowder being stored in the town of Concord, Massachusetts.
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The night before the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, the steeple of this Boston church glowed with the light of two lanterns. The lights were a signal to the patriots that British troops, known as "recoats", were coming to search for weapons in Concord by secretly crossing the river to Charles Town. Once they knew which way the redcoasts were coming, three riders, including a silversmith named Paul Revere, raced off to warn people along the way.
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A few weeks after the outbreak of war, representatives from the thirteen colonies formed the Second Continental Congress that would serve as an emergency government throughout the war. While The Second Congress was just getting underway here at the statehouse in Philadelphia, the war spread as American fighters in the colony of New York. At the same time armed militias took up positions in the hills around Boston.
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The United States of America was born here, within the walls of the State House of Colony of Pennsylvania, on the fourth of July 1776. When the Declaration of Independence was presented to Congress. This room was unusually quiet that day as men stepped forward to sign their names to the document; for all of them realized the great importance, and danger, of what they were doing.
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Many Americans were just learning that Independence had been declared when war broke out in New York and spread to New Jersey and Pennsylvania. It began when British soldiers and hired German troops called Hessians assembled to attack New York City. After a lot of fighting, British forces took control of the city and chased Washington's army across New Jersey into Pennsylvania.
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Near here, on Christmas night, in 1776, Washington and his men went on the offensive. They crossed the icy Delaware River and slipped back into New Jersey. WIth the element of surprise on their side, American forces went on to win important battles at Trenton and nearby Princeton.
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Two months after the fighting at Saratoga, Washington began to set up his winter encampment here at Vally Forge, Pennsylvania. About a day's ride from Philadelphia. Soliders built rows of log cabins like these and in a short time the Valley Forge encampment became the second largest city in the United States, with a population of twelve thousand men.
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In 1778, the summer after Valley Forge, the British under took a major military campaign in the southern state where a lot of people were against independence. So the British abandoned Philadelphia and soon warfare ended in the North. Late in December of 1778, the king's force seized Savannah, Georgia and soon took control of the whole state.
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By October of 1781, a large force of British troops led by General Cornwallis had reached Yorktown Virginia. An old tobacco port near the Cheaspeake Bay, where the last battle of the Revolutionary War was to be fought. On the outskirts of Yorktown, the British set up encampment positioned their weapons.
