Continental Congresses
This city hosted the First Continental Congress in September 1774.
Philadelphia
This act in 1775 declared the American colonies to be in Rebellion.
Parliament's Prohibitory Act
The date of the battles of Lexington and Concord.
April 19, 1775
The date Congress formally adopted the Declaration of Independence.
July 4, 1776
This 1777 American victory convinced France the colonists could win, leading to the alliance.
Saratoga
The Virginian chosen as commander in chief of the Continental Army.
George Washington
This act reduced the power of the Massachusetts legislature while increasing the power of the royal governor.
The Massachusetts Government Act
The two riders who warned the countryside that British troops were marching.
Paul Revere and William Dawes
The principal author of the Declaration.
Thomas Jefferson
This is the nickname for those who maintained their loyalty to the king.
Tories
The statement originally issued by Massachussetts called for the colonies to boycott British goods in order to urge Parliament to repeal the Intolerable Acts.
The Suffolk Resolves
Paine argued that this institution was absurd and that government should rest on the consent of the governed.
Monarchy
The British marched to Concord to seize these.
Colonial military supplies (the militia's weapons and gunpowder)
The Declaration's opening section is built on this Enlightenment idea.
Natural rights
This 19-year-old French nobleman became a major general in the Continental Army.
The Marquis de Lafayette
This July 1775 petition was Congress's final attempt at reconciliation with the king.
The Olive Branch Petition
This is the argument Parliament made as to why the colonists did not need to elect their own officials.
Virtual Representation
Ralph Waldo Emerson's famous phrase for the first shots fired at Lexington.
"The shot heard round the world"
The longest section of the Declaration.
Grievances
The 1781 siege where Cornwallis surrendered, effectively ending the war.
Yorktown
This is the percentage that trade fell by following the British blockade of American ports between 1775-1777.
95%
40%
This was the first true battle was fought between the opposing armies on the outskirts of Boston.
Battle of Bunker Hill
This Virginian introduced the resolution for independence on June 7, 1776.
Richard Henry Lee
This was determined to be the Western boundary of America after the peace treaty.
The Mississippi