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The Stamp Act
-Boycotted British goods
-Required colonists to buy and place stamps on items
-First tax to affect the colonists directly -
Townshend Acts
-Replaced the Stamp Act
-Taxes on more imports and on tea
-Colonists felt that Parliament had no right to tax them -
Boston Massacre
-A group of Boston protestors gathered to harass British soldiers
-A British soldier shot and killed 5 colonists which increased the tension between them
-Colonists had assemblies to talk about the threats to American Liberties -
Boston Tea Party
-The British made the colonists even madder by taxing tea and allowed them to trade tea
-One night, several colonists snuck aboard on a British ship carrying tea and dumped it all out in the Boston Harbor
-The Boston Tea Party angered King George lll -
Lexington and Concord
-British soldiers marched to Lexington and Concord. Colonists were preparing for the war to begin against Britain
-The Battle of Lexington only lasted for 15 minutes
-The colonial soldiers killed a bunch of British soldiers on there way back to Boston -
Second Continental Congress
-The First Continental Congress met again
-Some leaders at the meeting declared independence from Great Britain
-The Congress created an army with George Washington as their commander -
Olive Branch Petition
-Congress sent King George lll a peace offering.
-King George rejected the Olive Branch Petition
-King George urged Parliament to order a naval blockade of the American Coast -
The Declaration of Independence
-People's rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness cannot be taken away
-"All men are created equal"
Natural rights to life (Unalienable rights) -
Battle of New York
-British forces won
-Colonists were forced to retreat
-The British took over New York City -
Battle of Trenton
-A surprise attack on the Colonial Army
-Captured almost 1,000 British Soldiers
-Colonial Army attempted to take back Philadelphia -
Period: to
Battle of Saratoga
-The turning point of the entire war
-Proved the colonists could compete with the British with more advanced equipment
-French recognized the colonist's victories and joined them -
Period: to
Valley Forge
-Soldiers retreated there for shelter
-Camped there and suffered from hunger and frostbite
-More than 2,000 soldiers died -
Europeans Allies Shift the Balance
-The French begin helping the colonists
-Friedrich von Steuben helped train the continental army to make them stronger
-The colonists used the French navy as an advantage against the British -
The British Surrender at Yorktown
-American and French forces decided to attack Cornwallis at Yorktown
-French naval force defeated the British fleet on the Chesapeake Bay
-The British surrendered and the Americans won! -
Treaty of Paris
-Agreement between the British and Americans
-British gave America all the land from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River
-America rejected the British system of government
