James L Roark ● Michael P. Johnson
Patricia Cline Cohen ● Sarah Stage
Alan Lawson ● Susan M. Hartmann
Understanding the American
Promise: A Brief History
CHAPTER 6: The Making of an
American Revolution
1754-1775
Copyright © 2011 by Bedford/St. Martin’s
I. How did the Seven Years’ War
lay the groundwork for colonial
crisis?
A. French-British Rivalry in the Ohio
County
• 1. New France territory challenged by PA and VA
• 2. French build forts
• 3. VA send G. Washington to warn French of VA
claims
• 4. French defeat Washington at “Fort Necessity” July
1754
B. The Albany Congress
1. British convene a colonial conference
2. Prime goal was to secure Mohawk help
against French
3. Albany Plan of Union
4. No colonies, or the British, approved the
Albany Plan
C. The War and Its
Consequences
1. Britain suffered in early fighting, 1755 - 1757
2. War became a global conflict; British success
3. Consequences
The Treaty of of Paris: 1763
D. British Leadership,
Pontiac’s Uprising, and the
Proclamation of 1763
1. 1760 – King George III crowned
2. Ottawa chief Pontiac attacked British in
northern Ohio
3. British issued law preventing settlement west
of Appalachian Mountains
II. Why did the American
colonists find offense with
the Sugar and Stamp Acts
of 1763 – 1765?
A. Grenville’s Sugar Act
1. Revenue Act of 1764 – lowered tax on French
molasses
2. Stiffened penalties for smuggling
3. Generally a failure
B. The Stamp Act
1. Feb. 1765 – tax on paper used for official
documents
2. Administration delegated to Americans
3. Virtual representation
C. Resistance Strategies
1. Political resistance
2. “Sons of Liberty”
3. Demonstrations
D. Liberty and Property
1. Protests spread in the colonies – Stamp Act
Congress
2. “Life, liberty, property”
3. Stamp Act repealed March 1766
4. Declaratory Act
III. What were the colonial
responses to the
Townshend duties?
A. The Townshend Duties
1. Revenue Act of 1767 - taxation through trade
duties
2. Some revenue would pay salaries of royal
governors
3. Massachusetts assembly led protest
4. Repealed 1770, except for tea tax
B. Nonconsumption and the
Daughters of Liberty
1. Nonconsumption and nonimportation
2. Daughters of Liberty – female cooperation
3. Success – imports fell by 40%
C. Military Occupation and
“Massacre” in Boston
1. Fall of 1768, British troops occupied Boston
2. Protest in Boston resulted in British soldiers
killing five
3. Trial resulted in two manslaughter convictions,
others
acquitted
The Boston Massacre
IV. What led to the
escalation of tensions after
1772?
A. The Calm before the Storm
1. Trade boomed in 1770-71
2. Gaspee affair
3. Committees of correspondence
The Boston Tea Party
B. Tea in Boston Harbor
1. Tea Act of 1774
2. Reminder of Parliament’s claim to the power of
taxation
3. Dec. 16, 1774 Boston Tea Party
C. The Coercive Acts
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
1. Punishment for the Boston Tea Party
2. The Quebec Act
3. Americans called all five the Intolerable Acts
4. A continental congress
5. Rural unrest
6. Powder Alarm
7. Preparation for a crisis
E. The First Continental
Congress
•
•
•
•
1. Philadelphia, September 1774
2. Declaration of rights
3. Committees of public safety
4. Agreed to meet in next May
V. What were the varieties of
domestic insurrections in
1774-1775?
A. Lexington and Concord
• 1. Gage’s surprise attack – April 19, 1775
• 2. Warning system
• 3. Lexington
• 4. Concord
Events of 1774-1775
B. Rebelling against Slavery
1. Dunmore’s Proclamation
2. Ethiopian Regiment
3. Phillis Wheatley
VI. What changes did
Americans want in 1775?
A. Rights as British citizens
• 1. Self-taxation
• 2. Live free of an occupying army
• 3. Self-rule