Essay Sample about Revolutionary War: The Battles of Lexington and Concord

In April of 1607, three ships carrying 107 English settlers landed in the Americas and settled on a marshy island nearly 50 miles inland from the Chesapeake Bay and named it Jamestown. And by the early 1770s, there were a total of 13 British colonies. Until they gained their independence, the colonists were seen as citizens of Great Britain and as subjects to the king. But many were unhappy with this arrangement for a variety of reasons, one of the main reasons being the excessive taxation, lack of representation in the British government, and restrictions on how far they could expand into Western territories. 

One of the first points of contention was when King George III issued the Proclamation of 1763. This forbid any settlements beyond the Appalachian Mountains as an effort to prevent any further run-ins with Native Americans. The British government feared that allowing westward expansion would damage their economic system, stating that it could give the colonies opportunities to gain economic independence. Though the boundary was ignored by eager colonists, with little to no consequence, it was successful in restricting private, Virginia-based land companies and their investors trying to capitalize on the land in the Ohio Valley. Many members of the Virginia gentry believed the Proclamation’s controls on trade and migration, was discriminatory against people, French and Indian War veterans, in particular, seeking to alleviate personal debts through profitable landholdings. 

During the Seven Year's  War, British military commanders stationed in North America found it difficult to persuade the assemblies of some uncooperative colonies to pay for the costs of housing and provisioning the soldiers sent over to fight the French. And once the war had ended, the king’s advisors decided that some British troops should remain there. So, on March 24, 1765, the British Parliament passed the Quartering Act. According to an article posted on the American Battlefield Trust website, the act didn't insist British soldiers be allowed in the private homes of the colonists, but it did make their legislatures responsible for paying for and providing for barracks or other accommodations to house British troops. 

Parliament claimed that stationing them in the colonies would act as protection from foreign invasion. But some colonists saw it as unnecessary and as just another excuse to gain more profit, seeing as Britain had acquired a lot of war debt. 

The King and Parliament believed they had the right to tax the colonies. They decided to demand several kinds of taxes from the colonists to help pay for the War. These taxes included the Stamp Act, passed in 1765, which required the use of special paper bearing an embossed tax stamp for all legal documents. And other laws, such as the Townsend Acts, passed in 1767, required the colonists to pay taxes on imported goods like tea.

And relationships between British soldiers and colonial civilians were often tense and would occasionally become violent, especially in Boston. In the most famous incident, on March 5, 1770, after a few heated exchanges, a group of British soldiers fired into a crowd of people, killing five and wounding six in an event that would eventually be known as the Boston Massacre. Tensions grew even higher between the soldiers and the colonist and eventually led to December of 1773 when numerous Bostonians, in an act of defiance, dumped thousands of pounds of British tea into Boston Harbor, and Parliament responded by closing the Boston Port.

In 1774, The First Continental Congress met to discuss Joseph Galloway's Plan of Union, also called The Albany Plan of Union. It was essentially a plan to place the British North American colonies under a more centralized government and express their concerns, as they felt they were not being addressed.

"Resolved, that this Congress will apply to His Majesty for a redress of grievances under which his faithful subjects in America labor; and assure him that the colonies hold in abhorrence the idea of being considered independent communities on the British government, and most ardently desire the establishment of a political union, not only among themselves but with the mother state, upon chose principles of safety and freedom which are essential in the constitution of all free governments, and particularly that of the British legislature. And as the colonies from their local circumstances cannot be represented in the Parliament of Great Britain, they will humbly propose to His Majesty and his two houses of Parliament the following plan, under which the strength of the whole empire may be drawn together on an emergency, the interest of both countries advanced, and the rights and liberties of America secured A Plan for a Proposed Union between Great Britain and the Colonies of New Hampshire, the Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, the Three Lower Counties on the Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. (Plan of Union, 1774)”

But despite the support of many colonial leaders, the plan did not become a reality. There were still quite a few people who didn't want to separate from Great Britain. 

Revolutionaries in several areas supported the crown for a variety of reasons. Some resistance came from officials who had strong ties to the British government. These individuals who were used to working within the system to achieve their goals or benefiting from the system of government were more likely to support British policy given their role.

Other colonists just valued the stability, order, and protection the British Empire brought. They were fearful of how trade would be affected if they lost the protection of the British Navy. And historically, they paid much less for government services and military than those in Great Britain. And although they might not have liked being taxed without consent, taxes in Britain were far greater than those in America. Independence would mean sacrificing those benefits.

But eventually, tensions between British troops and the colonists in Boston grew significantly. On April 19, 1775, soldiers arrived on the Lexington Green and were met by the Massachusetts minutemen. The confrontation quickly turned into large-scale bloodshed after shots were fired into the crowd. This moment became known as the Battles of Lexington and Concord that began the American War for Independence.