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Treaty of Paris (French and Indian War)
The French and Indian War began in 1754 and ended with the Treaty of Paris in 1763. The war provided Great Britain enormous territorial gains in North America, but disputes over subsequent frontier policy and paying the war's expenses led to colonial discontent, and ultimately to the American Revolution. -
The Proclamation Line of 1763
With the proclamation, the British government was the only entity that was allowed to trade or buy land from the Indians. The colonial governments and citizens of the new world were not allowed to make any type of agreement with the Indians for land or for other supplies. At the Appalachian Divide, the land to the west of it, was given to the Indians by the British government. -
Sugar Act
The colonists were undergoing a period of financial difficulties and their resentment was due to both the economic impact of the Sugar Act as well as the constitutional issue of taxation without representation. The Sugar Act of 1764 was seen as detrimental to Colonial America and was one of the laws that sewed the seeds of rebellion in the colonies when it was enforced. The Sugar Act and the Stamp Act were some of the laws that led to anger and ultimately revolution in Colonial America. -
Stamp Act
The Stamp Act came when the British Empire was deep in debt from the Seven Years’ War and was looking to its North American colonies to solve the dept. The colonists resorted to mob violence to intimidate stamp collectors into resigning. Parliament repealed the Stamp Act in 1766, but issued a Declaratory Act at the same time to reaffirm its authority to pass any colonial legislation it saw fit. 10 years later, the colonists rose in armed rebellion against the British. -
The Quartering Act
The Province of New York assembly passed an act to provide for the quartering of British regulars, and went went way beyond the expiration Thomas Gage requested. The colonists disputed the legality of this Act because it violated the Bill of Rights of 1689. The act stated that Great Britain would house its soldiers in American barracks and public houses. All other colonies, with the exception of Pennsylvania, refused to comply with the Quartering Act; this act expired on March 24, 1767. -
Declaratory Act
Along with the repeal of the Stamp Act, British Parliament passed the Declaratory Act, which declared British authority to make and pass laws for the colonies. There was no immediate reaction to the act. However, when Parliament asserted in 1767 that it could pass any laws by majority, the colonies were infuriated. The Declaratory Act turned out to be one of the most important events in the buildup to the Revolutionary War. -
Townshend Act
The Townshend Act was a series of acts by the Parliament - the Revenue Act, the Indemnity Act, the Suspending Act, and the Commissioners of Customs Act - that contradicted the colonial principle of self-government and provoked so much opposition that in the end, most of the acts were repealed. An uneasy truce and suspension of hostilities ensued. However, the duty on tea was retained, which eventually led to the Boston Tea Party and the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War. -
Boston Massacre
The Boston Massacre was important because it helped reignite calls for ending the relationship between the American colonists and the British. It was also crucial in galvanizing colonial society against the British, which ultimately led to the Revolutionary War. -
Committees of Correspondence
The Committees of Correspondence were the American colonies’ means for maintaining communication lines in the years before the Revolutionary War. The exchanges that followed built solidarity during the turbulent times and helped bring about the formation of the First Continental Congress in 1774. -
Tea Act
The Tea Act of 1773 was one of several measures imposed on the American colonists by the heavily indebted British government in the decade leading up to the American Revolutionary War (1775-83). The colonists had never accepted the constitutionality of the duty on tea, and the Tea Act rekindled their opposition to it. Their resistance culminated in the Boston Tea Party on December 16, 1773. Parliament responded with a series of harsh measures; two years later the war began. -
Boston Tea Party
This act of American colonial defiance served as a protest against taxation due to the Tea Act. While consignees in Charleston, New York, and Philadelphia rejected tea shipments, merchants in Boston refused to concede to Patriot pressure. 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. -
Coercive Acts/ Intolerable Acts
The Coercive Acts/ Intolerable Acts are names used to describe a series of laws used to describe the laws passed to punish the colonists for the Boston Tea Party. This is significant because it led up to the first continental congress. -
1st Continental Congress
A meeting of fifty six delegates from twelve of the thirteen colonies in response to the Intolerable acts. Their goal was to try to appeal to the king and get the Intolerable acts halted, but to no avail. This is significant because this made the colonists realize that their voices were being ignored which led up to the second continental congress. -
Battle of Lexington and Concord
"The shout heard 'round the world"
Following the declaration of Independence, the Battle of Lexington and Concord was the first battle of the American Revolution. -
2nd Continental Congress
A convention of delegates from the 13 colonies with about 50 in attendance, that started meeting in the spring of 1775. The people at the second continental congress created the committees that wrote the Articles of Confederation and the Declaration of Independence. -
Battle of Bunker Hill
A battle fought during the American Revolution in Massachusetts. Despite the British winning the battle, it was a moral victory for the colonists. -
Thomas Paine's 'Common Sense'
A pamphlet written by Thomas Paine in which he advocated for independence from Great Britain to the people of the colonies. -
Declaration of Independence
The Declaration of Independence is the document written by the 2nd Continental Congress during the meeting at the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia. Which announced the thirteen colonies were independent of Great Britain -
Battle of Saratoga
Short for two battles that issued the killing blow to a british invasion from canada during the Revolutionary war. This resulted in an american victory, which convinced the French government to formally recognize the colonists cause and enter the war on their side. -
Battle of York Town
A three-week siege of Yorktown that forced British General Cornwallis to surrender to George Washington in a field at Yorktown on October 17, 1781, effectively ending the American Revolution. -
Treaty of Paris (American Revolution)
The Treaty of Paris of 1783 ended the revolutionary war and recognized American independence.