Massachusetts, which at the time of the American Revolution included the District of Maine, was the intellectual and commercial engine of colonial resistance. A thriving print culture and powerful merchant class made Boston the early center of opposition to British taxation. The Stamp Act of 1765 galvanized the Sons of Liberty, and the Boston Tea Party of 1773 provoked the Coercive Acts, which shut the port, reshaped colonial government, and rallied the other colonies to a common cause. By spring 1775, Governor Thomas Gage sent troops to seize militia supplies, triggering the Battle of Lexington and Concord and the siege of Boston. The Battle of Bunker Hill followed, then Henry Knox's winter expedition hauling cannon from Fort Ticonderoga to Dorchester Heights, which forced the British evacuation on March 17, 1776. The evacuation showed the wider colonies that military victory against the world's greatest empire was possible—and set the stage for Massachusetts to become a proving ground for republican government.
Interviewees
-
Sara Martin
- Editor in Chief, The Adams Papers, Massachusetts Historical Society
-
Kanisorn Wongsrichanalai
- Peter Drummey Chief Historian, Massachusetts Historical Society
