The Maryland Revolutionary War Memorial Park at the Governor Ritchie Overlook
The Maryland Revolutionary War Memorial Park at the Governor Ritchie Overlook
August, 1765:
Zachariah Hood was an Annapolis businessman who in 1765 was given the job of stamp collector under the new Stamp Act for the Province of Maryland. He was attacked by an angry mob and was forced to flee to New York for his life in what may have been the first forcible resistance in America to British taxation in the years preceding the American Revolution.
November 23, 1765:
Frederick became the first community in the colonies to formally protest the Stamp Act, which placed a tax on legal documents and printed material. Twelve judges in Frederick County repudiated the Stamp Act on November 23, 1765, refusing to require local residents to use stamped papers during a meeting held in a home on Record Street near the county courthouse.
May 1774:
The Chestertown Tea Party was a protest against British excise duties which, according to local legend, took place in May 1774 in Chestertown, Maryland as a response to the British Tea Act.
June 11, 1774:
A group of outraged citizens gathered at Charles Hungerford’s tavern in the town of Rockville, Maryland to publicly declare solidarity with their besieged fellow Americans following the Boston Tea Party (December 16, 1773)
September – October, 1774:
Maryland was one of the first to establish a Committee of Correspondence so as to foster collective resistance among all the colonies against British taxation and repression. It was influential in establishing the First Continental Congress. They convened in Philadelphia in September and October of 1774 to petition Britain to repeal the Intolerable Acts.
October 19, 1774:
Burning of the Peggy Stewart. (For More Information)
December 12, 1774
:
The Maryland Convention resolved that all men 16 – 50 form themselves into militia companies, choose officers, arm and drill. Once a month they were to drill on muster day. Maryland was already preparing for war before the first shots were fired at Lexington in April, 1775.
December, 1774:
Captain Mordecai Gist organized the Baltimore Independent Cadets
March 22, 1775:
A committee of thirty-four Harford, Maryland citizens met at the Bush Tavern and, after deliberation, signed the famous Bush Declaration. The document is characterized as the first Declaration of Independence ever adopted by an organized body of men duly elected by the people.
April 19, 1775 – March 17, 1776:
At the siege of Boston, 100 men from Frederick marched 550 miles to join George Washington’s siege of the town.
June 15, 1775:
Thomas Johnson nominates G. Washington as Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army
June 14, 1775:
Congress establishes the Continental Army of 10,000 men, including 3,340 from Maryland.
July 26, 1775:
Association of Freemen of Maryland who were representative form all the counties then in Maryland officially declare Maryland in rebellion against England and formed a Committee of Safety to defend the colony
January 18, 1776:
The Maryland Provincial Convention established and equipped the Maryland militia as a regiment of uniformed regular thereby creating a cohesive, disciplined unit. They were to be full-time regular state troops.
July 4, 1776:
The Declaration of Independence
July 17, 1776:
St. George Island, Maryland was the site of a battle in the American Revolutionary War where British forces under the command of John Murray, 4th Earl of Dunmore attempted to land on the mainland in Maryland. Maryland's Flying Camp militia under the command of Captain Rezin Beall, who was wounded in action in this battle, repulsed the invading British, preventing the invasion of the mainland.
August 2, 1776:
The Declaration of Independence is signed, including by the four Marylanders: Charles Carroll of Carrollton, Samuel Chase, William Paca, and Thomas Stone.
August 27, 1776:
Maryland is named the “Old Line State” to honor the Maryland 400, members of the 1st Maryland Regiment ,who repeatedly charged a numerically superior British force during the Battle of Long Island so as to allow the Continental Army to escape total destruction by the British.
“Good God! What brave fellows I must this day lose!”
G. Washington
December 20, 1776 – February 7, 1777:
The Second Continental Congress moves from Philadelphia to Baltimore to avoid capture by British forces, who were advancing on Philadelphia, the new American capital city. They met in the large and comfortable Henry Fite Tavern.
1781 – 1782
:
John Hanson from the Port Tobacco area served as President of the Continental Congress from 1781 to 1782. Hanson was the first person to serve a full term as President of the Congress under the Articles of Confederation
July 1775 – Oct 1781:
Tench Tilghman serviced as commissioner for Native American treaties to ensure their neutrality, lieutenant with the Continental Army’s Flying Camp, aide de camp to George Washington, interpreter for the French.
September 3, 1783:
The Treaty of Paris is signed
November 26, 1783 – June 3, 1784:
Annapolis becomes the capital of the new, and independent America.
December 23, 1783:
General George Washington resigns his commission as the Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army in the Old Senate Chamber of the Maryland State House.
January 14, 1784:
The Treaty of Paris was ratified by the Congress of the United States, while they met in the Senate Chamber of the Maryland State House. The Treaty formally ended the Revolutionary War and established the United States as a free and independent nation