US History Chapter 5

the first military engagements of the American Revolutionary War.[1] They were fought on April 19, 1775, in Middlesex County, Province of Massachusetts Bay, within the towns of Lexington, Concord, Lincoln, Menotomy (present-day Arlington), and Cambridge, near Boston. The battles marked the outbreak of open armed conflict between the Kingdom of Great Britain and its thirteen colonies in the mainland of British North America.

drafted on July 5, 1775, was a letter to King George III that was shipped and put on a boat on July 8, 1775, and received six weeks later from members of the Second Continental Congress who—for the final time—appealed to their king to redress colonial grievances in order to avoid more bloodshed. The Olive Branch Petition has been called different names over the years, the most popular of which include The Second Petition to the King and The Humble Petition.

the inhabitants of the German state of Hesse. In American English, it often refers to eighteenth century German regiments in service with the British Empire that fought against the American colonists during the American Revolutionary War.

members of teams of select men from the American colonial militia during the American Revolutionary War. They vowed to be ready for battle against the British within one minute of receiving notice. These teams consisted about a fourth of the entire militia, and generally were the younger and more mobile, serving as part of a network for early response to any threat.

a document prepared by the Second Continental Congress to explain to the world why the British colonies had taken up arms against Great Britain. It is a combination of the work of Thomas Jefferson and Colonel John Dickinson.

the site of the camp of the American Continental Army over the winter of 1777-1778 in the American Revolutionary War. This was a time of great suffering for George Washington's Army, but it was also a time of retraining and rejuvenation.

Also known as Battle of Bunker Hill, took place on June 17, 1775 on Breed's Hill, as part of the Siege of Boston during the American Revolutionary War. General Israel Putnam was in charge of the revolutionary forces, while Major-General William Howe commanded the British forces.

fought from April 5 to May 4, 1862, as part of the Peninsula Campaign of the American Civil War.

the set of treaties which ended the American Revolutionary War. On 3 September 1783, representatives of King George III of Great Britain signed a treaty in Paris with representatives of the United States of America - commonly known as the Treaty of Paris (1783) - and two treaties at Versailles with representatives of King Louis XVI of France and King Charles III of Spain - commonly known as the Treaties of Versailles (1783).

the first governing document, or constitution, of the United States of America. The thirteen states were formally thirteen independent countries ("states") until ratification of the Articles, proposed in 1777, was completed in 1781; at that point the "United States of America" legally came into existence, but, as stipulated in the Articles (and in the Constitution of the United States that succeeded them), the states retained full sovereignty and all functions of sovereignty not specifically deputed to the government of the federation.

adopted by the United States Congress on May 20, 1785. Under the Articles of Confederation, Congress did not have the power to raise revenue by direct taxation of the inhabitants of the United States. Therefore, the immediate goal of the ordinance was to raise money through the sale of land in the largely unmapped territory west of the original colonies acquired from Britain at the end of the Revolutionary War.

an act of the Congress of the Confederation of the United States. The Ordinance unanimously passed on July 13, 1787. The primary effect of the ordinance was the creation of the Northwest Territory as the first organized territory of the United States out of the region south of the Great Lakes, north and west of the Ohio River, and east of the Mississippi River.

Convention to propose amendments to the United States Constitution as an alternative to the process of securing two-thirds approval in both houses of Congress.

an armed uprising in Western Massachusetts from 1786 to 1787. The rebels, led by Daniel Shays and known as Shaysites (Regulators), were mostly small farmers angered by crushing debt and taxes. Failure to repay such debts often resulted in imprisonment in debtor's prisons or the claiming of property by the state.