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The Albany Plan
The British Board of Trace called a meeting of seven of the northern colonies at Albany. At this meeting, the problems addressed was colonial trade, and the French's dangerous attacks against them. Benjamin Franklin then proposed the Albany Plan, including delegates for all thirteen colonies. Delegates would have power to make war and peace with others and regulate taxes. The plan was soon turned down by the colonies. -
The Stamp Act
The Parliament had passed a number of laws including the stamp act. The stamp act required the use of tax stamps on all legal documents, certain business agreements and newspapers. Nine delegates were sent to New York protesting against the unfair law resulting in it soon being repealed. -
Boston Massacre
The Boston Massacre was a deadly riot that occurred on March 5, 1770, on King Street in Boston. It began as a street brawl between American colonists and a lone British soldier, but quickly escalated to a chaotic, bloody slaughter. The conflict energized anti-Britain sentiment and paved the way for the American Revolution. -
Boston Tea Party
American colonists, frustrated and angry at Britain for imposing “taxation without representation,” dumped 342 chests of British tea into the harbor. The event was the first major act of defiance to British rule over the colonists. It showed Great Britain that Americans wouldn’t take taxation and tyranny sitting down, and rallied American patriots across the 13 colonies to fight for independence. -
1st congress
Delegates from each of the 13 colonies except for Georgia met in Philadelphia as the First Continental Congress to organize colonial resistance to Parliament's Coercive Acts. The founding fathers were opposed to the thought of independence, but soon wrote a Declaration of Rights protesting Britain's colonial policies. -
Intolerable acts
The Intolerable Acts consisted of a number of measures meant to punish the port of Boston and the people of Massachusetts for the Boston Tea party. Parliament, now under the leadership of Lord North, passed the first of these measures, the Boston Port Act. This act provided that the port of Boston would be closed until the East India Company received compensation for the loss of the tea and the Royal Government received payment for the lost income it would have received on the customs duty. -
2nd Congress
The British refused to compromise, and reverse its colonial policies. They responded to the Declaration of Rights with stricter consequences. The day the Second Congress met, the 'shot around the world had been fired, and hope of compromise from Britain was lost. -
Battle of Lexington and Concord
On the night of April 18, 1775, hundreds of British troops marched from Boston to nearby Concord in order to seize an arms cache. Paul Revere and other riders sounded the alarm, and colonial militiamen began mobilizing to intercept the Redcoat column. A confrontation on the Lexington town green started off the fighting, and soon the British were hastily retreating under intense fire. -
Declaration of Independence
In 1776, a five-man committee including Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and Benjamin Franklin was tasked with drafting a formal statement of the colonies’ intentions. The Congress formally adopted the Declaration of Independence–written largely by Jefferson–in Philadelphia on July 4, a date now celebrated as the birth of American independence. -
American Revolution
Skirmishes between British troops and colonial militiamen in Lexington and Concord in April 1775 kicked off the armed conflict, and by the following summer, the rebels were waging a full-scale war for their independence.The French entered the war on the side of the colonists in 1778 After French assistance helped the Continental Army force the British surrender at Yorktown, Virginia, in 1781, the Americans had effectively won their independence, though fighting would not formally end until 1783.
