Chapter 16 - Atlantic Revolutions, Global Echoes 1750-1914

We are shifting gears from the Enlightenment to the American Revolution. The American Revolution started in 1775 to 1783, where it was known as the war of independence who was carried by the American colonies against Britain influenced political ideas and revolutions around the world. This war was between the Kingdom of Great Britain and thirteen British colonies on the North American continent. The war was the culmination of the political American Revolution, by which the colonists overthrew British rule. In 1775, Revolutionaries captured and controlled each of the thirteen colonial governments, set up the Second Continental Congress, and formed a Continental Army. The following year, they formally declared their independence as a new nation, the United States of America. In 1778, European powers would fight on the American side in the war. Meanwhile, Native Americans and African Americans served on both sides. Throughout the war, the British were able to use their naval superiority to capture and occupy coastal cities, but control of the countryside largely to avoid them due to their relatively small land army. Early in 1778, after an American victory at Saratoga, France entered the war against Britain; Spain and the Netherlands linked as allies of France over the next few years. Finally, the Treaty of Paris in 1783 ended the war and recognized the dominance of the United States over the territory surrounded by what is now Canada to the north, Florida to the south, and the Mississippi River to the west. Yet another war to bring peace to the world. What would the world be if there was no war to be fought? Would there be treaties to set boundaries?