The year was 1763. Great Britain owned the largest amount of land in North America. Her colonies were very prosperous and the citizens enjoyed governing themselves. After the French and Indian War, Britain began tightening its hold on the colonies, and tensions began rising between the colonists and England. Great Britain was in a huge debt because of the French and Indian War , so to raise money, Parliament began imposing new laws and placing taxes on the colonists. The colonists were very upset because they didn't have a voice in the government which violated their rights as English citizens. The Stamp Act, the Boston Massacre, and the Tea Act were huge events that led up to the Revolutionary War, and finally pushed the colonists to break …show more content…
The colonists hated the soldiers, and tried their best to get rid of the hated redcoats. When England sent the soldiers over to the colonies, King George III made a new law called the Quartering Act, which stated that the colonists must house the soldiers and provide them with food, water, and alcohol. The colonists didn’t think that they should have to accommodate the soldiers, after all, they were supposed to be protecting the colonies, but they weren’t doing much, so as a result, the colonists felt that if the soldiers were just sitting around, then why should they have to equip them? Nobody resented the redcoats more than the Bostonians. They would make fun of the redcoats by calling them “lobsterbacks” , and found every way possible to aggravate the soldiers. One day, this rivalry led to a disaster on the streets of Boston. It was March 5, 1770, and a group of particularly fiery Bostonians were taunting the soldiers. They were getting closer and closer to the troops, and without warning, the soldiers opened fire on the citizens. The troops ended up killing five Bostonians. Sam Adams, a Patriot, called the event “a horrid massacre.” Paul Revere, a well known silversmith and a Patriot, engraved a picture depicting the scene. “When the shooting ended, several were dead, and many more were …show more content…
Once again, angry Patriots revolted and so the Townshend Duties were repealed, which led to a short period of peace between the colonies and Britain. However, the peace was shattered in 1773, when Lord North imposed a new Act, the Tea Act. The British East India Tea Company was close to going broke because of the boycott against British tea that many colonists participated in. The Tea Act gave Britain complete control over the tea trade and lowered the cost of the tea so it was dirt cheap. Lord North hoped to trick the colonists into buying the tea since it was extremely inexpensive, but the colonists knew that Parliament was still trying to tax them even though they weren’t represented in the government. On December 16, 1773, perhaps the biggest protest the colonists participated against Parliament occurred. A group of Patriots known as the Sons of Liberty dressed up as Mohawk Indians, boarded three British ships docked in Boston Harbor, and threw all of the tea overboard. George Hewes was one of the Patriots who participated in what was known as the Boston Tea Party. He wrote down an account of what happened that night. “We had thus broken and thrown overboard every tea chest to be found in the ship, while those in other ships were disposing of the tea in the same way, at the same time.” When the Patriots heard about the Boston Tea Party, they were
The Tea Act was putting tax on tea sold by other companies other than the East India Company. A group of colonists wanted to make things change was the Sons of Liberty. Led by Samuel Adams and John Hancock. They had secret meetings and then took action
“Highly burdened by taxes themselves, the British were merely asking the colonies to bear the expense of their own administration and defense.” So, Britain needed money because they were helping them out but when they asked for it, the colonists protested. By doing this they were hurting Britain. Overall, they didn’t show any respect towards the King who had helped them out when they needed
During the early 1700s, the protests in the colonies against British policies quieted down, but that does not mean that the colonists were satisfied with the British government. The Tea Act was intended to help the British East India Company. Everyone that had been drinking tea was paying taxes that Parliament had placed on them without their consent. The Tea Act however, lowered the price to the tea by allowing the East India Company to ship tea directly to the colonies. Lots of Colonial leaders argued that even though the price of tea was lowered, colonists still had to pay the tax on the tea.
The political protest known as the Boston Tea Party took place on the evening of December 16, 1773, in Boston, Massachusetts. The political protest was a demonstration of rebellion orchestrated by the Sons of Liberty in order to protest the Tea Act. The royal governor of Massachusetts, Thomas Hutchinson, allowed three ships- The Dartmouth, The Eleanor, and The Beaver- to enter the Boston Harbor. The ships were carrying tea to sell to the colonists on behalf of the British East India Company.
Leading up to the Boston Massacre Who knew that a shot fired by British soldiers in the streets of Boston in 1770 would spark the American Revolution? It all started with King George III, who became king of Great Britain and Ireland in 1760. He was only 22 years old. The first war that he participated in was known as the French and Indian War. “When France’s expansion into the Ohio River valley brought repeated conflict with the claims of the British colonies, a series of battles led to the official British declaration of war in 1756.”
In order to send the army the British government passed the Quartering Act, the purpose of this act was to make it easier to enforce order. However, the colonists took this “as an infringement of charter rights that threatened the liberties of all colonies.” The standing army was considered a violation of their rights because the colonists did not view it as a form of protection but one of force and control. The colonists thought that the British government was preparing to invade them if needed. This belief was not a radical one because in Britain’s past history, Parliament was afraid the king would use his standing army to invade the citizens.
Then the colonist made it seem that it was the soldiers fault by writing articles and drawing pictures. I know this because if you see the image that Paul Revere about the Boston Massacre it shows how the colonist are just standing there begging for mercy but it seems that the soldiers are being mischievous by killing the colonist. This picture was drawn by Paul Revere, this image was made in Boston. This supports my evidence because Paul Revere was in a group called “Our Sons of Liberty” which was against the British Government, so Paul made it seem like it was all the soldiers fault because they are shooting the “innocent” colonists. Many people saw this article and image so they decided to join the colonists side and they when against the soldiers by stop buying all British
This event had a major influence on the colonists. In 1768, Parliament sent a several hundred British troops to Boston due to the colonists’ refusal to buy imported goods from England. Their purpose was to protect tax collectors and other officials. The colonists resented the troops. On March 5, 1770, a group of colonists started throwing snowballs at the British soldiers and insulted them.
However, in 1773, the East India Company noticed that there was an overproduction of tea and its prices surely would decline (“The Third Imperial Crisis”). Tea was one of the, if not the, most valuable asset to many members in Parliament. Britain was forced to impose a new Tea tax on the colonists, which was aimed to keep the price of tea high. Even this act was reasonable in the eyes of the British, but to the colonists, this was just a British way of assuring dominance considering it was now for profit rather than to pay off debts. The response to the Tea Acts was the Boston Tea Party of 1773 (“The Third Imperial Crisis”).
This primary source account was a letter written by John Andrews to a relative. He was simply trying to get the word out about the Boston Tea Party by sharing his experiences with his family. The Boston Tea Party was a protest because of the tax on the tea. British Parliament had just annulled most of the import taxes enforced on the colonies, but decided to leave the tax on imported tea to prove its authority. In November of 1773, three ships arrived in the Boston harbor with 342 chests of tea.
The massacre leads to propaganda against the British in order to vilify England’s rule in the public eye and sparks thoughts of freedom throughout the colonies. The Sons of Liberty, a secret society of colonists, took an active part in the opposition of British taxes and rule, as well as rallying the people against the British. The British repeal the Townshend Duties several weeks after the massacre in an effort to maintain good relations with the colonies. However, this attempt fails as the colonists begin to rebel more and more openly against British rule. In 1773, the British establish the Tea Act in order to support the ailing East India Company, the same year, colonists dressed as Native Americans infiltrate a ship which carried tea from the East India Company and tossed the entire shipment of tea into the harbor, ruining it.
The Boston Massacre was not a random event there were many actions that had led up to this massacre. On March 5, 1770 shots were fired from the British toward the colonists. But why?Why did the British fire? The Boston Massacre was important to the American revolution because the British killed unarmed colonists and the event would counting to spark the start of revolution.
The Boston Massacre was a street fight that occurred on March 5, 1770, between a “patriot”. They were throwing sticks, snowballs, and trash at a group of British troops. The loyalists got very annoyed with the patriots so they shot into the mob killing five. The riot began when around 50 colonists attacked a British sentinel. A British officer called in for additional troops
This was when a few British soldiers opened fire on the crowd, killing and wounding a few colonists. On December 16, 1773, a group of men boarded on three British ships in the Boston harbor and threw their tea cargo in the sea; it was a protest against the Tea Act that was passed by the British Parliament.
At the start of an evening on December 16, 1773, a horrible crime was committed. A group of Patriots who called themselves the Sons of Liberty boarded three British East India Company Ships and dumped hundreds of chests of perfectly good and cheap tea into the Boston Harbor to protest against the Tea Act. In order to sneak onto the ships and wreck havoc, they pretended to be Native Americans. The Sons of Liberty dumped 342 chests of tea into the Boston Harbor.