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Timeline:
Toward a Revolution
1750-1783

1750:

The rapidly growing population of Britain's North American colonies now numbers one million, while about six million people live in England and Wales.

1752: Georgia, the last of the thirteen English settlements to be founded, becomes a royal colony. In this colony, as in other royal colonies, the king appoints a governor and a council.
July 1754: A skirmish on the western frontier between French troops (supported by Indians) and American colonists begins the French and Indian War.
September 1759:

The French and Indian War (the Seven Years War) is a worldwide contest between Great Britain and France and their respective allies.

During the Seven Years War, a British army in Canada led by General James Wolfe wins a decisive battle against the French by taking Quebec.
October 1760: George III becomes King of England and ruler of the British Empire. He favors new political leaders and advisors who follow a stricter policy toward the colonies.
February 1763: The Treaty of Paris ends the Seven Years War. In defeat, France gives up most of its claims to North American territory.
April 1764: Parliament passes the Sugar Act to raise money from the colonies through import taxes. In response, Boston merchants refuse to buy English luxury goods.
March 1765: The Stamp Act, the first tax to affect all the colonies equally, becomes law. The Quartering Act requires colonists to provide lodging for British troops.
May 1765: Virginia's House of Burgesses adopts Patrick Henry's Stamp Act Resolves, which protest taxation without representation.
August 1765: Angry mobs force stamp distributors to resign, and many merchants and other colonists agree not to import British goods.
October 1765: Colonial delegates to the Stamp Act Congress in New York reject Parliament's right to tax the colonies.
March 1766: Bowing to pressure from British merchants, Parliament repeals the unsuccessful Stamp Act but restates its supreme authority over the colonies.
June 1767: The Townshend Acts impose duties on glass, tea, and other items imported into the colonies. The Americans react by adopting non-importation agreements and refusing to buy British goods.
May 1769: Virginia's House of Burgesses restates its exclusive right to tax Virginians and condemns British actions.
March 1770:

British soldiers, sent to support local British officials, fire into an angry Boston crown and kill five people. This incident soon becomes known as the Boston Massacre.
April 1770: Realizing that the Townshend Acts are discouraging the purchase of British goods, Parliament repeals all the taxes except the tax on tea, which cannot be grown in North America.
May 1773: The Tea Act gives the British East India Company a monopoly on sales. In protest, patriots in New York and Philadelphia force ships to return to England without unloading their cargoes of tea.
December 1773: Patriots dressed as Indians board ships in Boston harbor and dump more than 300 chests of tea overboard to prevent it from being unloaded and sold.
March 1774: Parliament passes the Boston Port Act as punishment for the Boston Tea Party, closing the harbor to all seaborne trade.
May 1774: Virginia's House of Burgesses supports Boston by observing a day of fasting and prayer. Virginia calls for a unified colonial response through a boycott of British goods.
October 1774:

Delegates from each colony arrive in Philadelphia. They form the First Continental Congress and declare that Americans are entitled to the rights of "life, liberty, and property."

The Congress forms the Continental Association, an agreement that calls on the colonies to stop all imports from Britain and provides for local committees to enforce its provisions.
November 1774:

Yorktown residents stage a southern tea party, boarding the ship Virginia and dumping chests of tea into the York River.

Throughout the colonies, local leaders begin to prepare for military resistance and develop new political institutions to replace British authority.
February 1775: Parliament declares Massachusetts to be in a state of rebellion. British General Gage is authorized to use force to control the colony.
April 1775: British troops, attempting to capture colonial military supplies, exchange gunfire with Massachusetts minutemen at Lexington and Concord.
Lord Dunmore, the Royal Governor of Virginia, seizes the colony's store of gunpowder from the Magazine in Williamsburg.
May 1775: In New York, Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys capture Fort Ticonderoga and its heavy artillery from the British.
June 1775:

Two important events, the Battles of Bunker Hill and Breed's Hill take place in Boston. The British win the struggles but suffer heavy losses.

George Washington is appointed commander-in-chief of the Continental forces. Congress enacts the Articles of War.
December 1775: An American assault on Quebec, led by Generals Richard Montgomery and Benedict Arnold, is repulsed, and Canada remains under British control.
May 1776: France begins secretly sending money and military supplies to the colonies.
June 1776: The Virginia Revolutionary Convention passes George Mason's Declaration of Rights, the first bill of rights to be adopted in America.
July 4, 1776: The Second Continental Congress approves the final version of the Declaration of Independence.
October 1781: General Cornwallis surrenders at Yorktown. As a result of the American victory, Britain begins peace talks with its former colonies.
September 1783: The Treaty of Paris is signed whereby Britain recognizes the United States as an independent nation.