1. The Road to Revolution

2. Magna Carta (Great Charter)
Agreement between Barons and King John in 1215
Guaranteed certain liberties to landowners
For example, no freeman shall be imprisoned except without judgment by his peers.
Colonists interpreted the Magna Carta to mean “no taxation without representation!”

4. English Bill of Rights 1689 Freedom of speech and debates is allowed;
No excessive fines may be imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted;
There is a right to trial by jury;
There is a right to petition the king.

5. 1763 – Relations with England
Proclamation of 1763
No colonists to settle west of the Appalachians
10,000 British troops to remain in the colonies
Writs of Assistance – Customs officers could search for smuggled goods

6. The Stamp Act (1765)
Passed by Parliament to pay for British troops (P.M. Grenville)
Tax on all paper and documents
In protest: Colonists boycotted British goods and held the Stamp Act Congress
Stamp Act was repealed
The Declaratory Act was passed (1766)

7. Townshend Acts (1767) Named for Finance Minister
Tax on Imports (not a direct tax)
Paint
Glass
Lead
Paper
Tea
Permitted Writs of Assistance
Led to another boycott (Nonimportation Agreement)

8. Boston Massacre (March 5, 1770)
Dockworkers taunted British soldiers (Redcoats)
British guards shot at the crowd
5 people were killed (including Crispus Attucks, an African American sailor)
Townshend Acts repealed by new P.M. Lord North (except for tea)

10. Tea
Parliament passed the Tea Act (1773) to bail out the East India Company
500,000 lbs of tea were sent to the colonies
Sons of Liberty boarded 3 ships and dumped tea into Boston Harbor

12. Coercive (Intolerable) Acts March 1774
Series of laws passed by Parliament
- Closed the port of Boston
- British officials to be tried in English Courts
- Quartering Act
- Massachusetts’ charter changed to reduce right to self-government
Called Intolerable Acts by colonists

13. Quebec Act (1774) Extended the province of Quebec to the Ohio Valley
Allowed French Canadians to keep their laws and language
Colonists feared this was to keep them out of the west and to get rid of jury trials (civil law)

14. Continental Congress The Albany Plan of Union comes alive
Sept. 1774, 56 delegates from all colonies except Georgia met in Philadelphia
Passed Suffolk Resolves which agreed to end trade with England
Approved training of a militia
Agreed to meet again the following year

15. Carpenter’s Hall

17. The Battle Begins
April 1775 – New England militias were called “minutemen”
Storing arms and ammunition in Concord, Massachusetts (20 miles outside of Boston)
April 18th, British were seen getting ready to march out of the city
Paul Revere, William Dawes and Dr. Samuel Prescott rode through the night to warn the minutemen to be ready

18. Lexington
On the morning of April 19th, the British arrived in Lexington.
70 minutemen were waiting
Shots rang out and 8 minutemen were killed

19. Concord The British continued to Concord
The minutemen were waiting at the North Bridge
They drove the British back
Minutemen waited all along the road back to Boston to attack the retreating British
73 British soldiers were killed, 174 wounded

20. Salem Gazette, Salem, MA (April 1775)
“The troops came in sight just before sunrise … the Commanding Officer accosted the militia in words to this effect: “Disperse, you rebels, damn you, throw down your arms and disperse” upon which the [American] troops huzzaed, and immediately one or two [British] officers discharged their pistols, which were instantaneously followed by the firing of four or five of the soldiers… Eight of our men were killed and nine wounded.”

21. London Gazette, London, England (June 1775)
“Six companies of light infantry … at Lexington found a body of country people under arms, on a green, close to the road. And upon the King’s troops marching up to them, in order to inquire the reason of their being so assembled, they went off in great confusion. And several guns were fired upon the King’s troops from behind a stone wall, and also from a meeting house and other houses … In consequence of this attack by the rebels, the troops returned the fire and killed several of them.”

22. Lexington & Concord (April 18-19, 1775)
By the rude bridge that arched the flood, Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled, Here once the embattled farmers stood, And fired the shot heard round the world. Ralph Waldo Emerson (1837)

23. Battle of Bunker Hill Mainly fought on Breed’s Hill in Boston
Patriots led by Colonel Samuel Prescott
Patriots were low on ammunition
“Don’t fire until you see the whites of their eyes”
British technically won but had heavy losses
More than 1000 British casualties