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Colonial Timeline
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Jamestown
On May 14, 1607, the Virginia Company explorers landed on Jamestown Island to establish the Virginia English colony on the banks of the James River, 60 miles from the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. -
Virginia House of Burgesses
The House of Burgesses of Virginia was the first legislative assembly of elected representatives in North America. The House was established by the Virginia Company, who created the body as part of an effort to encourage English craftsmen to settle in North America and to make conditions in the colony more agreeable for its current inhabitants. It's first meeting was held in Jamestown, Virginia, on July 30, 1619. -
Plymouth Rock
Plymouth Rock is the traditional site of disembarkation of William Bradford and the Mayflower Pilgrims who founded Plymouth Colony in 1620. -
Mayflower Compact
The Mayflower Compact was the first governing document of Plymouth Colony. It was written by the Separatists, fleeing from religious persecution by King James of England. -
Bacon's Rebellion
Bacon's Rebellion was an armed rebellion by Virginia settlers led by young Nathaniel Bacon against the rule of Governor William Berkeley. The colony's disorganized frontier political structure combined with accumulating grievances helped to motivate a popular uprising against Berkeley. He had failed to address the demands of the colonists regarding their safety. The rebellion was first suppressed by a few armed merchant ships from London whose captains sided with Berkeley and the loyalists. -
Glorious Revolution
The Glorious Revolution was the overthrow of King James II of England by a union of English Parliamentarians with the Dutch stadtholder William III of Orange-Nassau. -
Toleration Act
The Toleration Act was an Act of the Parliament of England, which received the royal assent on May 24th 1689. The Act allowed freedom of worship to Nonconformists who had pledged to the oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and rejected transubstantiation, i.e., Protestants who dissented from the Church of England such as Baptists and Congregationalists but not to Catholics. Nonconformists were allowed their own places of worship and their own teachers, if they accepted certain oaths of allegiance. -
English Bill of Rights
The Bill of Rights was a restatement in statutory form of the Declaration of Right presented by the Convention Parliament to William and Mary in March 1689, inviting them to become joint sovereigns of England. It lays down limits on the powers of the crown and sets out the rights of Parliament and rules for freedom of speech in Parliament. -
Salem Witch Trials
The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. Despite being generally known as the Salem witch trials, the preliminary hearings in 1692 were conducted in a variety of towns across the province. -
John Peter Zenger
John Peter Zenger was a German American printer, publisher, editor and journalist in New York City. Zenger printed The New York Weekly Journal. He was a defendant in a landmark legal case in American jurisprudence, known as "The Zenger Trial", in which his lawyer, Andrew Hamilton, established that truth is a defense against charges of libel. In late 1733, Zenger began printing The New York Weekly Journal to voice his opinions critical of the colonial governor, William Cosby. -
1st Continental Congress
The First Continental Congress was a convention of delegates from twelve colonies that met on September 5, 1774, at Carpenters' Hall in Philadelphia, early in the American Revolution. It was called in response to the passage of the Coercive Acts by the British Parliament. The Intolerable Acts had punished Boston for the Boston Tea Party. -
French and Indian War
The war was fought primarily between the colonies of British America and New France, with both sides supported by military units from their parent countries of Great Britain and France, who declared war on each other in 1756. In the same year, the war escalated from a regional affair into a world-wide conflict. The war was fought primarily along the frontiers separating New France from the British colonies from Virginia to Nova Scotia. -
Proclamation of 1763
This proclamation was issued by King George III following Great Britain's gaining of French territory in North America after the end of the French and Indian War, in which it forbade settlers from settling past a line drawn along the Appalachian Mountains.The purpose of the proclamation was to organize Great Britain's new North American empire and to stabilize relations with Native North Americans through regulation of trade, settlement, and land purchases on the western frontier. -
Quartering Act
Parliament ordered local governments of the American colonies to provide the British soldiers with any needed accommodations. It also required colonists to provide food for any British soilders in the area. -
Stamp Act
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 money collected by the Stamp Act was to be used to help pay the costs of defending and protecting the American frontier near the Appalachian Mountains. -
Declatory Act
The Declaratory Act, was an Act of the Parliament of Great Britain, which accompanied the repeal of the Stamp Act. Parliament repealed the Stamp Act because boycotts were hurting British trade and used the declaration to justify the repeal and save face. The declaration stated that Parliament's authority was the same in America as in Britain and asserted Parliament's authority to pass laws that were binding on the American colonies. -
Boston Massacre
The Boston Massacre was an incident in which British Army soldiers killed five male civilians and injured six others. British troops had been stationed in Boston, capital of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, since 1768 in order to protect and support crown-appointed colonial officals attempting to enforce unpopular Parliamentary legislation. -
Tea Act
The Tea Act launched the final spark to the revolutionary movement in Boston. The act was not intended to raise revenue in the American colonies. It was designed to prop up the East India Company which was struggling financially and burdened with eighteen million pounds of unsold tea. This tea was to be shipped directly to the colonies, and sold at a bargain price. -
Boston Tea Party
The Boston Tea Party was political protest by the sons of liberty in Boston. Disguised as American Indians, they hurt no one but destroyed the entire supply of tea sent by the East India Company in defiance of the American boycott of tea carrying a tax the Americans had not authorized. They boarded the ships and threw the chests of tea into Boston Harbor, ruining the tea. The British government responded harshly and the episode escalated into the American Revolution. -
2nd Continental Congress
The Second Continental Congress was a convention of delegates from the 13 colonies that started meeting, in Philadelphia, soon after warfare in the American Revolutionary War had begun. It succeeded the First Continental Congress, which met between September 5, 1774 and October 25, 1774, also in Philadelphia. The second Congress managed the colonial war effort, and moved incrementally towards independence, adopting the United States Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776 by raising armies, -
Declaration of Independence
The Declaration of Independence is a statement adopted by the Continental Congress which announced that the thirteen American colonies regarded themselves as independent states, and no longer a part of the British Empire. Instead they formed a union that would become a new nation- the United States of America. John Adams was a leader in pushing for independence, which was unanimously approved on July 2. -
Treaty of Paris
The Treaty of Paris was signed by the kingdoms of Great Britain, France and Spain, with Portugal in agreement, after Britain's victory over France and Spain during the Seven Years' War. The signing of the treaty formally ended the Seven Years' War, otherwise known as the French and Indian War in the North American theatre, which marked the beginning of an era of British dominance outside Europe.
