Timeline of the American Revolution

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    The French and Indian War

    Britain declared war on France. The war for control of the
    valley was called the French and Indian War. Most American
    Indians in the region were allies of the French. The American
    Indians liked the French because they traded but did not settle
    on the land. In 1757, Britain sent more soldiers to North America. This helped defeat the French in Canada. In 1763, Britain and
    France ended the war and signed the Treaty of Paris.
  • The Procalamation of 1763

    The Procalamation of 1763
    The Royal Proclamation of 1763 was issued October 7, 1763, by King George III following Great Britain's acquisition of French territory in North America after the end of the French and Indian War/Seven Years' War, which forbade all settlement past a line drawn along the Appalachian Mountains.
  • The Sugar Act

    The Sugar Act
    The Meaning and Definition of the Sugar Act: The Sugar Act of 1764 was a British Law, passed by the Parliament of Great Britain on April 5, 1764, that was designed to raise revenue from the American colonists in the 13 Colonies. The Act set a tax on sugar and molasses imported into the colonies which impacted the manufacture of rum in New England. The Sugar Act was part of the policy of Mercantilism that favored England by controlling trade.
  • The Stamp Act

    The Stamp Act
    The Stamp Act was passed by the British Parliament on March 22, 1765. The new tax was imposed on all American colonists and required them to pay a tax on every piece of printed paper they used. Ship's papers, legal documents, licenses, newspapers, other publications, and even playing cards were taxed.
  • The Quartering Act

    The Quartering Act
    Quartering Act is a name given to a minimum of two Acts of British Parliament in the local governments of the American colonies to provide the British soldiers with any needed accommodations or housing. It also required colonists to provide food for any British soldiers in the area.
  • The Boston Massacre

    The Boston Massacre
    The Boston Massacre was a street fight that occurred on March 5, 1770, between a "patriot" mob, throwing snowballs, stones, and sticks, and a squad of British soldiers. Several colonists were killed and this led to a campaign by speech-writers to rouse the ire of the citizenry.
  • The Battle of Alamance

    The Battle of Alamance
    The Battle of Alamance was the final battle of the War of the Regulation, a rebellion in colonial North Carolina over issues of taxation and local control.
  • The Tea Act

    The Tea Act
    Tea Act of 1773 (13 Geo 3 c 44) was an Act of the Parliament of Great Britain. The principal objective was to reduce the massive amount of tea held by the financially troubled British East India Company in its London warehouses and to help the struggling company survive.
  • The Boston Tea Party

    The Boston Tea Party
    On the night of December 16, 1773, Samuel Adams and the Sons of Liberty boarded three ships in the Boston harbor and threw 342 chests of tea overboard. This resulted in the passage of the punitive Coercive Acts in 1774 and pushed the two sides closer to war.
  • The Intolerable Acts

    The Intolerable Acts
    The Intolerable Acts were the American Patriots' term for a series of punitive laws passed by the British Parliament in 1774 after the Boston Tea Party. They were meant to punish the Massachusetts colonists for their defiance in throwing a large tea shipment into Boston Harbor.
  • Fighting at Lexingtion and Concord

    Fighting at Lexingtion and Concord
    The Battles of Lexington and Concord fought on April 19, 1775, kicked off the American Revolutionary War (1775-83). Tensions had been building for many years between residents of the 13 American colonies and the British authorities, particularly in Massachusetts.