Quote Originally Posted by Phil
I remember little or nothing beyond mention of the Boston Tea Party being taught about the American Revolution. There was something about General Wolfe and Quebec but this was earlier and nothing to do with the revolution.
Wolfe & Quebec actually have quite a bit to do with the Revolution, since the Seven Years/French & Indian Wars were indirectly responsible for it. Without going into one of my lectures, in 1763, with the defeat of the French, and the end of New France, the British government expected the colonists to pay for the war, at which the colonial assemblies balked. Add to the fact that Britain had promised her Indian allies that their lands west of the Appalachians would be protected from further settlement (tell that to the Scots-Irish), and the stage was set for the "unpleasantness" between the North American colonies and Britain.

Parliament saw nothing unreasonable about the Americans paying for the army and navy that had been defending them from the French, Spanish and their Indian allies since the late 1600s, and the American assemblies jealously guarded their right to raise revenues (even though the average Briton paid twice as much in taxes as an American colonist). Add to that the debate over who was supreme in power -- colonial assemblies or parliament, and there you have the spark that started the forest fire in 1775.

Regards,

Todd