C H A P T E R 5 : S E C T I O N 2

BUILDING COLONIAL UNITY

TROUBLE IN BOSTON

• 1768• Parliament sends troops to Boston to

prevent rebellion• Colonists are upset• British violated colonial rights• Sent an army to occupy colonial cities

• British soliders acted rudely and violently towards colonists• Stole goods• Competed for jobs

THE BOSTON MASSACRE

• March 5, 1770• Fight between Bostonians and soldiers• Angry Bostonians moved toward

customhouse, where British taxes were collected• Crowd threw sticks and stones at the

soldiers• One soldier is knocked down

• British soldiers open fire, killing five colonists

• Crispus Attucks, a dockworker who was part African and part Native American is killed.

• Colonial Leaders use this even as propaganda• Propaganda: Information made to influence public

opinion• Paul Revere creates an engraving of the event• Samuel Adams puts up posters

• Parliament repealed all of the Townshend Acts taxes except the one on tea• The colonists who had been boycotting, ended their

boycott except for the one on tea

• 1772• The Boston committee of correspondence begins

airing the colonies’ grievances against Great Britain• Samuel Adams

• Committees of Correspondence• Spread throughout the colonies• Unite colonists who disagree with British policies

THE TEA ACT

• 1773: British East India Company faced bankruptcy• The Tea Act• Allowed the company a virtual monopoly of tea in

America• Company could sell its tea directly to shopkeepers

and bypass colonial merchants• Merchants called for a new boycott

THE BOSTON TEA PARTY

• December 16, 1773• Boston Harbor• Sons of Liberty dressed up as Mohawks

boarded 3 tea ships• Threw 342 chests of tea overboard

THE COERCIVE ACTS

• 1774• Harsh laws intended to punish the people of

Massachusetts• Closed Boston Harbor until the tea was paid

for• Prevented the arrival of food and other supplies

from entering Boston Harbor

• Banned most town meetings in New England• Forced Bostonians to shelter soldiers in

their homes

• The other colonies sent food and clothing to support Boston

• Quebec Act• Set up a government for Quebec• Gave Quebec the area west of the Appalachian

Mountains and north of the Ohio River• Ignored colonists claim to the land

• Colonists name the Coercive Acts and the Quebec Act: the Intolerable Acts