American Revolutionary War

By David Head

Students, history buffs and anyone interested in our founding fathers and crucial people and events that led to the formation of America can easily find answers at their fingertips. This 6-page timeline contains many facts that come up today in everything from news stories to casual conversation. Get the facts.

Suggested uses:
• Students - Review before relevant history tests, support class lessons and textbook, impress your teachers & professors
• Teachers/Professors - fact bank to build tests & quizzes, lesson plan support, reference for documentary film viewing, supplement to the textbook
• Politics & Government – Facts for referencing roles of the Founding Fathers and the creation of the U.S. Constitution

• Language: English
• Publisher: BarCharts, Inc.
• Release date: May 1, 2018
• ISBN: 9781423237471

David Head

DAVID HEAD is a lecturer of history at the University of Central Florida and the author of Privateers of the Americas: Spanish American Privateering from the United States in the Early Republic (Georgia).

Book preview

Table of Contents

The Crumbling Colonial Relationship, 1763–1770

From Colonies to Independence, 1771–1776

Three Armies of the Revolutionary War

Winning Independence, 1777–1781

The War at Sea, 1775–1783

Governing an Independent Nation, 1775–1787

A New Constitution, 1787–1789

The Crumbling Colonial Relationship, 1763–1770

star 1763 star

The Treaty of Paris ends the SevenYears’ War, also known in the colonies as the French andIndian War.

France is driven from North America.

Canada is turned over to Britain.

Spain gains control of the Louisiana Territory, as France had induced Spain to join the war by promising the land in the Treaty of Fontainebleau (1762).

Pontiac’s Rebellion breaks out as Indians, upset about British policy changes following the Seven Years’ War, attack British forts throughout the Great Lakes region.

The Proclamation of 1763, issued to prevent colonists’ encroachment on Indian lands, forbids settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains while also organizing territories won during the Seven Years’ War as Quebec, East Florida, and West Florida.

Colonists resent the restrictions on their movement westward.

Britain is left with a massive debt from fighting the Seven Years’ War, owing approximately £137 million to its creditors.

Yearly interest payments total some £5 million. The prewar budget equaled about £8 million annually.

Offi cials estimate that defending and administering the colonies will cost at least £300,000 a year.

The Cider Riots break out in Britain in protest of a new tax on cider, demonstrating the challenge of raising new revenue domestically.

star 1764 star

Parliament passes the Sugar Act, an update of the widely evaded Molasses Act of 1733. Provisions of the new law include:

Lowering the tax on foreign molasses (a sugar product often used in rum production); Parliament believes a lower tax will reduce the incentive for smuggling.

Creating a list of enumerated goods, such as lumber, that may be shipped only to Britain.

Requiring that merchants and captains fi le additional paperwork before their ships sail.

Placing jurisdiction for court proceedings in vice admiralty courts, which do not use juries. The nearest court is located in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Requiring that customs officers live in the jurisdiction they oversee.

James Otis, of Boston, questions Parliament’s ability to tax without the consent of the colonies in his pamphlet The Rightsof the British ColoniesAsserted and Proved.

To fight inflation, Parliament passes the