Lesson 6: Actions Provoke the Colonists and British
CLASS NOTES
The Boston Massacre
 Trouble has been brewing for awhile
 4 regiments of British troops stationed in Boston
 British soldiers taking jobs from Bostonians
 Mob violence breaks out on March 5th
 Patriots antagonize the British troops
 Soldiers panic and open fire
 5 Bostonians killed and 6 wounded
 Massacre or self-defense?
 Patriots describe this event as a “massacre”
 British as self-defense with a lawless mob
The Boston Tea Party
 The Tea Act
 An attempt to save the British East India Company
 British monopoly of tea trade tried to force colonists to
buy British taxed tea
 Tea ships arrive
 Protestors prevented the ships from being unloaded
 Governor ordered British navy to block the harbor so the
ships could be unloaded
 Sons of Liberty dumped 342 chests of tea into the harbor
The Intolerable Acts
 Parliament passes new laws to show the colonies who the boss is
 Punish Massachusetts for the Boston Tea Party with 4
actions:
 closed Boston harbor until all the tea was paid for
 disbanded Massachusetts colonial assembly
 soldiers accused of crimes to be tried in England
 more soldiers sent to Boston
 Loyalists believe Bostonians have gone too far
 Colonies start to unite but many still divided
 First Continental Congress (September 1774) meets in
Philadelphia
 Send a respectful letter to King George III urging
him to consider their complaints and recognize
their rights
 A new boycott British goods
 Meet in May 1775 if the boycott didn’t work
 Colonies form militias
Lexington & Concord
 King George III rejects the colonies’ message and the king
decides to tighten his grip on the colonies
 General Gage, British commander in Boston, decides to take
action and destroy suspected colonial munitions in Concord by
sending 700 troops there on April 18, 1775
 Lexington (April 19, 1775)
 Paul Revere, William Dawes, and Samuel Prescott warn
colonists of the impending attack
 British troops marching to seize the munitions clash with
colonial militia – Minutemen – at Lexington resulting in
the death of 8 militiamen
 Concord
 Munitions moved by the time the British arrive
 Skirmish at Concord’s North Bridge – 2 Minutemen and 3
British soldiers killed
 On the march back to Boston, over 4,000 Minutemen
harass the British troops
 By the end of the day, 74 British soldiers are dead and
another 200 wounded or missing AND the Minutemen had
49 dead and 41 wounded
 Lexington and Concord proved that Americans were willing to
not only fight for their rights, but die for them