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Early in 1776, King George consented to the hiring of thousands of Hessian mercenaries to assist the British troops already in America in crushing the rebellion. The Revolutionary War lasted nearly eight years, largely because King George refused to surrender the colonies.

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Despite having little practical experience in managing large, conventional armies, Washington proved to be a capable and resilient leader of the American military forces during the Revolutionary War. While he lost more battles than he won, Washington employed a winning strategy that included victories at the Battle of Trenton in 1776 and Yorktown in 1781.

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The French and Indian War was the North American conflict in a larger imperial war between Great Britian and France known as the Sver Year's War. The French and Indian War began in 1754 and ended with the Treaty of Paris in 1763. The war provided Great Britain enormous territorial gains in North America, but disputes over subsequent frontier policy and paying the war's expenses led to colonial discontent, and ultimately to the American Revolution.

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The Proclamation of 1763 was a British-produced boundary marked in the Appalachian Mountains at the Eastern Continental Divide. Decreed on October 7, 1763, the Proclamation Line prohibited Anglo-American colonists from settling on lands acquired from the French following the Seven Years' War. This measure advanced British governmental efforts to discourage westward expansion in the decade before the American Revolution, and objective motivated by a number of sociopolitical and economic factors. The Treaty of Paris, signed on February 10, 1763, effectively removed France from the continent, forcing her to cede all territory east of the Mississippi River to the victor, Great Britain. In gaining these land holdings, the British declared their American colonies to be complete and secure from external threats.

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On March 22, 1765, the British Parliament passed the "Stamp Act" to help pay for British troops stationed in the colonies during the Seven Years' War. The act required the colonists to pay a tax, represented by a stamp, on various forms of papers, documents, and playing cards. It was direct tax imposed by the British government without the approval of the colonial legislature and was payable in hard-to-obtain British sterling, rather than colonial currency. Further, those accused of violating the Stamp Act could be prosecuted in Vice-Admiralty Courts, which had no juries and could be held anywhere in the British Empire.

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By reducing the tax on imported British tea, this act gave British merchants an unfair advantage in selling their tea in America. American colonists condemned the act, and many planned to boycott tea.

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The Boston Massacre marked the moment when political tensions between British soldiers and American colonists turned deadly. Patriots argued the event was the massacre of civilians perpetrated by the British Army, while loyalists argued that it was an unfortunate accident, the result of self-defense of the British soldiers from a threatening and dangerous mob. Regardless of what actually happened, the event fanned the flames of political discord and ignited a series of events that would eventually lead to American independence. John Adams believed that "on that night, the foundation of American independence was laid."

Following the end of the French and Indian War, Great Britain began to levy taxes on her colonies to defray the cost of the expensive war. However, colonies who had been in charge of taxing themselves began to openly resist Great Britian.

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The Boston Tea Party marked a critical moment in the history of the American Revolution as an act of colonial defiance against British rule. In Boston harbor, on 16 December 1773, American colonists, disguised as mohawk Indians, boarded British ships and threw 340 chests of tea owned by the East India Company into the water. It was protest about the tax on tea, levied without representation in the British Parliament and against the monopoly of the East India Company.

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The First Continental Congress convened in Carpenters' Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, between September 5 and October 26, 1774. Delegates from twelve of Britain's thirteen American colonies met to discuss America's future under growing British aggression. The list of delegates included many prominent colonial leaders, suck as Samuel many prominent colonial leaders, such as Samuel Adams of Massachusetts, and two future presidents of the United States, George Washington and John Adams. Delegates discussed boycotting British goods to establish the rights of Americans and planned for a Second Continental Congress.

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Many of the delegates who attended the Second Congress had also attended the First. They again elected Peyton Randolph as president of the Congress and Charles Thomson as secretary. Notable new arrivals included Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania and John Hancock of Massachusetts. Within two weeks, Randolph was summoned back to Virginia to preside over the House of Burgesses; Hancock succeeded him as president, and Thomas Jefferson replaced Randolph in the Virginia delegation. The number of participating colonies also grew, as Georgia endorsed the Congress in July 1775 and adopted the continental ban on trade with Britain.

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The Battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, were the first major military actions between the British Army and Patriot militias from British America's Thirteen Colonies During the American Revolutionary War. The opposing forces fought day-long running battles in Middlesex County in the Province of Massachusetts Bay, in the towns of Lexington, Concord, Lincoln, Menotomy, and Cambridge.

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After the disastrous engagements at Princeton, Cornwallis spent the winter months in London before returning to America for the spring campaign. He was instrumental in the British victory at Brandywine on September 11, 1777, and the capture of Philadelphia two weeks later. At the Battle of Brandywine, Cornwallis performed the engagement's decisive maneuver when he led 8,000 troops in a flanking attack that split the Continental Army's line. A few weeks later, Cornwallis seized on a distraction by General Howe and took the city of Philadelphia without firing a shot.

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In 1774 and 1775, the Boston Committee of Correspondence and the Massachusetts Committe of Safety employed Paul Revere as an express rider to carry news, messages, and copies of important documents as far away as New York and Philadelphia.

On the evening of April 18, 1755, Dr. Joseph Warren summoned Paul Revere and gave him the task of riding to Lexington, Massachusetts, with the news that British soldiers stationed in Boston were about to march into the countryside northwest of the town. According to Warren, these troops planned to arrest Samuel Adams and John Hancock, two leaders of the Sons of Liberty, who were staying at a house in Lexington. It was thought they would then continue on to the town of Concord, to capture or destroy military stores - gunpowder, ammunition, and several cannon - that had been stockpiled there. In fact, the British troops had no order to arrest anyone - Dr. Warren's intelligence on this point was faulty - but they were very much on major mission out of Boston.

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In 1778, Adams was sent to Paris, France, to secure aid for the colonists' cause. The following year, he returned to America and worked as the principal framer of the Massachusetts Constitution. By the early 1780s, Adams was in Europe again, serving in a diplomatic capacity.

In 1783, he, along, with John Jay (1745-1829) and Benjamin Franklin (1706-90), helped negotiate the Treaty of Paris, which officially ended hostilities between America and Britian. Franklin had served as the American minister to France since 1776, and while Adams often felt that he worked harder than Franklin, it was the older man's charm that opened diplomatic door for his blunter, more combative colleague.

Adams remained in Europe after the war and served as the United States' first ambassador to Britain from 1785 to 1788. After returning to America, he was a participant in the Constitutional Convention that nominated Washington to serve as the nation's first president. Adams lobbied for the vice presidency and won. (In early elections, the president and vice president were elected separately.)

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In May 1775, John Hancock was elected president of the Continental Congress, which was meeting in Philadelphia. The next month, the Congress choose George Washington (1732-1799) as commander of the Continental Army. (According to some accounts, Hancock had eyed the role for himself.) During the eight years of war that followed, Hancock used his wealth and influence to help fund the army and revolutionary cause.

On July 4, 1776, Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, a document drafted by Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) stating that the 13 American colonies were from British rule. The document also detailed the importance of individual rights and freedoms. As president of the Continental Congress, Hancock is credited as the first signer of the Declaration of Independence. His prominent, stylish signature became famous. (According to legend, Hancock boldly inscribed his name so the English king would not need glasses to read it.) Today, the term "John Hancock" is synonymous with "signature"