Quebec Act Archives - Journal of the American Revolution

Posted on May 2, 2024

Ten Causes of the Miscarriages in Canada: Why the 1775–1776 Invasion Failed

The once-promising Continental invasion of Canada was clearly headed for disaster by May 1776. With British forces chasing the American Army out of the Province of Quebec, Continental leaders started grappling with the fact that their ten-month strategic offensive in the north had failed. Canada would not be joining the Continental Congress as a fourteenth […]

by Mark R. Anderson

Posted on January 2, 2024February 12, 2024

Defining the Northwestern Limits of the New Republic

The British Library in London, England, houses an internationally significant and relatively understudied copy of Dr. John Mitchell’s renowned 1755 map, renamed and reprinted circa 1775 A Map of the British Colonies in North America. . .[1] This map garnered particular attention due to its use in the 1782 boundary negotiations conducted by the British […]

by Merv O. Ahrens

Posted on December 5, 2023January 16, 2024

The American Invasion of Canada

When the fighting between the British and American forces broke out on April 19, 1775, just one month prior to the start of the Second Continental Congress no one was sure just where things were going or how they were going to turn out, but one thing was acutely on everyone’s mind at the time. […]

by James M. Smith

Posted on October 31, 2023January 16, 2024

The Lord North Conciliatory Proposal: A Case of Too Little Too Late

Just prior to the start of hostilities in the American Revolution, and even early on in those battles, last-minute efforts were made in many quarters to reach a peaceful settlement to the differences between the belligerents. One lesser analyzed of these was Lord North’s Conciliatory Resolution, made in February 1775. This proposal, unlike an earlier […]

by Richard J. Werther

Posted on May 23, 2023May 24, 2023

John Dickinson and the Letter to Canada

After the French and Indian War the British government made a number of decisions with respect as to how it would govern its North American colonies. One was the Proclamation of 1763 in which it reserved all the lands west of the Appalachian Mountains for Native Americans. English settlers who had already settled there had […]

by James M. Smith

Posted on March 21, 2022

This Week on Dispatches: Mark R. Anderson on the Fate of King George III’s Bust in Montreal

On this week’s Dispatches, host Brady Crytzer interviews independent historian and JAR contributor Mark R. Anderson on the fate of King George III’s bust in Montreal in light of the more famous incident with the statue of the king in New York City at the start of the American Revolution. New episodes of Dispatches are […]

by Editors

Posted on March 3, 2022March 9, 2022

King George III’s Montreal Bust in a Pattern of Iconoclasm

Throughout history, changes in political order have often been accompanied by the destruction of the old regime’s images and monuments. The July 9, 1776 destruction of King George III’s New York City statue is the most famous and persistent image of such iconoclasm in the American Revolution. In that particular event, after a public reading of […]

by Mark R. Anderson

Posted on February 14, 2022February 13, 2022

Religion and the American Revolution: An Imperial History

BOOK REVIEW: Religion and the American Revolution: An Imperial History by Katherine Carté (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press/Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture, 2021) Dwight Eisenhower once said that “our form of government has no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith, and I don’t care what it […]

by Gabriel Neville

Posted on January 19, 2022January 18, 2022

Hell’s Half-Acre: The Fall of Loyalist Crean Brush

On October 18, 1777, New York provincial assemblyman, and tory, Crean Brush, penned his final will and testament from prison in Boston. After nineteen months of incarceration which included being held in irons, and “in a state of body and mind so debilitated by misfortune,” Brush made provisions for his wife Margaret, stepdaughter Frances, and […]

by Eric Wiser

Posted on March 17, 2021September 3, 2021

Virginia’s Independent Frontier Companies, Part 1 of 2

When the American Revolution began, the Virginia Colony faced not one military-territorial contest, but four. Its ousted Royal governor, Lord Dunmore, was in the Chesapeake actively plotting a forcible return to power. A longstanding dispute with Pennsylvania over the headwaters of the Ohio had turned violent. A formal peace with the Shawnee on the northwest […]

by Gabriel Neville

Posted on December 7, 2020December 3, 2020

The Colonists’ American Revolution: Preserving English Liberty, 1607–1783

The Colonists’ American Revolution: Preserving English Liberty, 1607-1783, by Guy Chet (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Blackwell, 2020) To my way of thinking, when we try to understand people and events in the past, we benefit more from channeling their understanding of their actions and beliefs, rather than identifying motivating forces that were hidden from them at […]

by Timothy Symington

Posted on August 5, 2019August 4, 2019

“That Damned Absurd Word Liberty:” Les Habitants, the Quebec Act, and American Revolutionary Ideology, 1774–1776

The American invasion of Quebec of 1775-1776 failed to achieve its primary objective: to bring into the fold what the Continental Congress referred to as “the only link wanting, to compleat the bright and strong chains of union.”[1] While Canada would not join its southern brethren in outright rebellion, the Americans’ campaign furnishes important insight into […]

by Sebastian van Bastelaer

Posted on July 9, 2019July 8, 2019

Les Habitants: Collaboration and Pro-American Violence in Canada, 1774–1776

The fleeting invasion of Canada in 1775, though often consigned to a bit-part in the American Revolutionary drama, proved vital to the emergence of American nationhood. The abortive attack at the walls of Quebec City on New Year’s Eve was one of the first of many major setbacks for the Continental Army and ensured there […]

by Sebastian van Bastelaer

Posted on January 15, 2019January 13, 2019

The Earl of Dartmouth: Secretary of State for the Colonies, Third Year: August 1774–November 1775

While the Earl of Dartmouth, Secretary of State for the Colonies, was on holiday in the summer of 1774, his office continued to receive and send communications concerning the political divergence with the American colonies. The general issues were the Quebec Act, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, the Declaration of Rights and Grievances, the Non-Importation Agreement, […]

by Bob Ruppert

Posted on November 22, 2018November 18, 2018

Continental Congress vs. Continental Army: Strategy and Personnel Decisions

When the American Revolution became a shooting war, it was left to the Continental Congress to become the body of state for the thirteen colonies. They had to build a functioning central government, build an economy, find allies and build a military force that would help them stand up to Great Britain. Over the course […]

by Stuart Hatfield

Posted on August 23, 2018August 22, 2018

Communities Divided: Massachusetts, January to March 1775

On January 1, 1775, Charles Stockbridge visited his neighbor’s house in Hanover, Massachusetts, twenty five miles south of Boston. He heard a rumor that opponents of the government would visit nearby Marshfield to harass Tories (supporters of the king), who were well known and vulnerable to trouble. His neighbor doubted the rumor was true.[1] Yet […]

by Will Monk

Posted on July 31, 2018August 15, 2018

The Canadian Patriot Experience

The American Revolution was in effect a civil war. It included all the heightened acrimony associated with one. In what became the United States, there was hostility and outright violence between those supporting the rebellion (“Patriots”) and those against it (“Loyalists”). Soldiers and families alike faced social ostracism, physical danger, loss of property, and for […]

by Richard J. Werther

Posted on January 12, 2017November 28, 2016

Blame Canada: The Quebec Act & the American Revolution

Ask a group of my 8th grade U.S. History students what the causes of the American Revolution were and they are likely recite a catalogue of British actions: the Navigation Acts, the Stamp Act, “No Taxation without Representation,” the Proclamation of 1763, and the Boston Massacre, among others (or at least their teacher would hope […]

by Geoff Smock

Posted on August 11, 2015August 28, 2016

Isaac Barré: Advocate for Americans in the House of Commons

Isaac Barré was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1726. He was educated at Trinity College and following graduation in 1745 enrolled at the Inns of Court. Within a year he lost interest in the law and decided to enter the military. He served as an infantry officer, becoming a captain in the 32nd Regiment of […]

by Bob Ruppert

Tag: Quebec Act