The war of British possessions on the territory of the current United States for independence from the mother country.

fighting began in 1775 after the American colonies refused to pay new taxes to the British treasury, the so-called "stamp duty" on all printed publications in America, from legal documents to playing cards established without consulting them. In the colonies, the opinion of the English philosopher John Locke was very popular, who argued that “the purpose of the state is the protection of property ... The sovereign or parliament cannot have the power to take all or part of the property of subjects without their consent, otherwise this will be a denial of all property.”

The colonies declared a boycott of English goods, and the "stamp tax" law failed. No more successful was the attempt to introduce customs duties here. In 1773, a large shipment of cheap Indian tea was delivered to Boston, which, however, included a small customs duty. December 16 Opponents british crown, disguised as Indians, attacked the ships and drowned all the cargo. This event became known as the Boston Tea Party. Since that time, increased armament of the militia in the colonies began and it became clear that an armed clash could not be avoided.

The thirteen colonies of the Atlantic coast convened a continental congress, which, effective December 1, 1774, prohibited the importation of any goods from England. At the same time, approximately 30 percent of the population of the colonies remained loyal to the British king. They were called "Loyalists". It was the loyalists who became allies of the British troops in the war that began soon.

The first battle took place on April 19, 1775 at Concord and Lexington in Massachusetts. The English detachment moved to Concord to disarm the local militias and seize the armory. At Lexington, he was ambushed by the militia. Breaking through the discordant fire of the colonists, the British reached Concord, where they ransacked the houses of the townsfolk (the warehouse had been almost completely emptied the previous day). The soldiers then came under fire from the militias and retreated. There were several dead and wounded on both sides.

Reinforcements arrived for the militias. Their number reached 2 thousand. The British began to retreat, fired on from all sides by the enemy. The light British infantry went behind the lines of the militias, trying to shoot them with close range. In Lexington, the English detachment had already lost all control, turning into a crowd, but here help approached them. However, the ranks of the militia were replenished with new volunteers.

The exhausting retreat of the British ended in Charlestown, where they finally found themselves under the protection of cannons. Royal Navy. British losses 73 were killed, 26 were missing and 174 were wounded. The Americans lost 49 killed, 5 missing and 41 wounded. Professional hunters from among the colonists shot clearly better soldier British regular army.

Following major battle happened at Bunker Hill on June 17, 1775. The British took revenge for Concord, but failed to lift the siege of Boston. Congress soon created the Continental Army, which was led in July by George Washington, a Virginia militia officer who had experience fighting with the British against the French in Canada. He captured Fort Tyconderoga, placed the guns captured there on the heights around Boston and forced the British to withdraw from the city with continuous shelling. On July 4, 1776, the Philadelphia Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, which declared the thirteen colonies to secede from the British crown.

In the autumn of 1775, the Americans invaded the Canadian province of Quebec, hoping to raise its population against British rule. In November, American General Richard Montgomery occupied the city of Montreal, and in December, together with another general, Benedict Arnold, who later defected to the British, unsuccessfully stormed the city of Quebec. In the spring of 1776, British troops drove the Americans out of the borders of Canada, whose population was by no means eager to join the American Revolution, fearing that their country would be swallowed up by their southern neighbor.

British troops besieged New York. In November 1776, Washington's army was defeated here and retreated to Pennsylvania. The general had no more than 3 thousand soldiers left, while the British had 34 thousand troops. But Washington on Christmas night 1776 made a surprise attack on the English garrison in Trenton and captured 900 people - mostly from among German mercenaries.

For almost the entirety of 1777 and the following year, 1778, both sides basically maneuvered without entering into pitched battle. British troops advanced through the southern states, while Washington's army remained in the north - near the borders of the British-occupied state of New York, where loyalist sentiments were strong. The only success of the Americans was the fighting in Saratoga. The army of British General John Barjoyne was surrounded and on October 17, 1777 laid down their arms. The defeat of the British was facilitated by the fact that they had insufficient supplies of food and gunpowder and were not prepared for military operations in difficult-to-pass forests. However, the combat effectiveness of the American army was also largely undermined by the hard winter of 1777/78 at the main camp at Valley Forge northwest of Philadelphia. Then many soldiers of the Continental Army died from hunger, cold and disease.

In the summer of 1778 there was a fundamental change in international position U.S.A. France, hoping to regain its possessions in Canada and India, declared war on England and entered into an alliance with the rebellious colonies. Subsidies from the French treasury helped the Americans to arm the army and significantly increase its numbers. This led to the success of the Continental Army. The position of the Americans was further strengthened when Spain declared war on England in June 1779, and Holland in December 1780. The combined Franco-Spanish fleet threatened to land troops on the British Isles. The Spanish laid siege to Gibraltar and captured the island of Menorca. The British government was increasingly not up to the North American colonies.

In 1779, General George Roger Clark drove the British troops out of the northwest and took control of the Frontier area - border areas with Indian tribes. The decisive campaign unfolded in 1780 in North and South Carolina. Here success was at first on the side of the British. British troops under General Charles Cornwallis occupied Charleston and defeated the Americans at the Battle of Camden on August 16, 1780. After that, the states of Northern and South Carolina came under British control. Only small partisan detachments"patriots", as the supporters of independence called themselves, continued attacks on British soldiers.

However, on October 7, 1780 American troops under the command of General Nathaniel Green, they won a victory at King Mountain. The British were forced to leave the territory of both Carolinas, except for Charleston, and retreat to Yorktown in Virginia, where they were blocked by the French fleet under the command of Admiral de Grasse. In September 1781, Washington's 11,000 army, supported by 6,000 French troops General Jean Baptiste Rochambeau broke through the defenses of the defenders of Yorktown. On October 19, 1781, having lost about 300 people from enemy artillery fire, Cornwallis capitulated with an army of 8,000 and 144 guns. Allied casualties were 88 Americans and 186 French. Thus, the number of British troops in North America decreased by a quarter.

The military operations on this actually ended. The French government no longer intended to keep significant contingents of its army and navy in this secondary theater of operations for it, and without French support, the Americans could not continue active hostilities.

The peace between the United States and England was signed in Paris on November 30, 1782, and was then confirmed by the final peace treaty between France and England in Paris on September 3, 1783. England recognized the independence of her colonies in North America, but retained Canada. By the end of 1783, British troops had left US territory. The American government pledged not to obstruct English creditors in recovering pre-war debts from American citizens, and Congress promised to "genuinely recommend" the return of confiscated Loyalist (or Tory, as the Patriots) property. This last promise remained empty. Up to 50,000 loyalists who fought on the side of England left the United States along with British troops, forced to abandon all their real estate. Together with family members total number more than 100,000 refugees. Approximately the same number of runaway Negro slaves left the colonies with the British. France received the British islands of Tobago and Santa Lucia and five of its colonial cities in India. Spain acquired Menorca and Florida.

American losses in the Revolutionary War were 4,000 killed and died of wounds and disease. British losses in this war were about the same. In addition, several thousand British and French soldiers died during the fighting in Europe, North America and India, fighting against each other. The Spanish army also suffered small losses, hardly more than a few hundred people.

As a result of the war for the independence of the British colonies in North America, a state was born that is now the most powerful in the world both in terms of accumulated national wealth and in terms of economic and military potential.

Previous page of the book

Brazil gained independence on September 7, 1822. Almost two hundred years have passed, and France does not even think of "letting go" of Guiana, and right in the first article of its constitution writes about the impossibility of such a development of events.

By the way, if few people know the country of Guiana itself, then its capital is on everyone's lips. The administrative center of French Guiana is the city of Cayenne.

A luxury SUV so popular in Russia is named after her. Truth, formerly the city Cayenne was a place of exile for convicts. In Russia they were exiled to Siberia, and in France criminals were sent to this tropical wilderness.

For this reason, Cayenne could not be a prestigious place and a luxury name. But who remembers this now? So, in frosty Moscow or Yekaterinburg, looking at the Porsche Cayenne turbo passing by, you can get visual representation about human forgetfulness and the "strangeness" of the world order at the same time ...

In fairness, we note that French overseas territories are not limited to Guiana alone. This is also Martinique, and Guadeloupe, and Reunion, and Tahiti, and New Caledonia, and Mayotte [ The Republic of France, as a real empire, left to itself islands scattered all over the world. Without delving into geography, just take a couple of examples. New Caledonia - the highlands of Melanesia, stretching for 400 km in pacific ocean. It consists of the Belep archipelago, the Isle of Pens, the Loyalty Islands and other small islands. The island was discovered by Cook in 1774. Napoleon III turned it into a place of hard labor. Mayotte is one of the four islands of the Conf archipelago, which is located in Indian Ocean, north of the Mozambique Channel ].

There is no such country as Tahiti, where a cat from one Soviet cartoon was well fed. There is no Guadeloupe country. There is only France. All the inhabitants of these territories are French. And they cannot, they have no right to secede from Paris, no matter how much they want to.

What it is? When Russia is reproached for “not letting go” of Chechnya or Tatarstan, what are we usually told? Russia is the last empire.

And therefore it is wrong, it is doomed, it supposedly has no future for it. When you hear such statements, know that all this is said from a lack of knowledge.

From dullness and bad manners. There are a lot of empires on the world map. The largest is the USA. Military bases around the world, the world's largest army. military budget, equal to the sum military budgets of all other states of the planet combined.

But it's obvious enough. Other empires are harder to see. For example, the British Empire simply disguised itself. Can Canada or Australia be considered an independent country if it is not governed by the prime minister, the head of the winning party, but by a governor general appointed by the queen of another country?

And the British queen declares war for Canada and Australia, is the commander-in-chief of the army, can dissolve their parliament at any moment. So what is independence?

But for the rest of the world this issue is not advertised. It is very comfortable. For what? For example, when it is necessary to create the appearance of an "international" discussion or an "international" commission.

Remember the sensational muddy story with the sinking of the South Korean military corvette Cheonan in the spring of 2010?

“The conflict between North Korea and South Korea escalated sharply after independent experts accused Pyongyang of torpedoing the South Korean corvette Cheonan” [taken from here: http://top.rbc.ru/politics/26/0S/20l0/412107.shtml]

What kind of commission, what kind of experts? “The report of the commission, which included experts from the United States, Australia, Great Britain and Sweden, states that the evidence found during the investigation confirms that the Cheonan was torpedoed by a North Korean submarine” [Obshchaya Gazeta. ru”, 05/20/2010 www.og.ru/news/2010/05/20/48575print.shtml].

A special international commission found Pyongyang guilty. Composition: USA, UK and Australia, headed by the same queen, and Sweden. You can negotiate with Sweden alone - all the other guys are from the same deck.

It's like assembling a commission of experts from Russia, Belarus, South Ossetia, Abkhazia. And for the assortment, for greater independence of the commission, to take a representative of Venezuela into it ...

Britain is still the most real empire, and to this day having overseas possessions. They are called the British Overseas Territories.

"The name 'British Overseas Territories' was introduced in 2002 by the British Overseas Territories Act and replaced the term" British dependencies"(Eng. British-Dependent Territories), contained in the British Nationality Act 1981.

Prior to this, the territories were called colonies or crown colonies. In relation to the British Overseas Territories, the name "British Overseas Territories" or simply "Overseas Territories" may also be used when the affiliation is clear from the context.

You see - if you spend five minutes reading, everything becomes obvious: "dependent territories", "formerly called colonies." There were colonies - there are colonies, whatever you call them.

But you can say and write everywhere that there is no empire - it ended in the middle of the 20th century, along with the granting of independence to the colonies. You can also confuse the situation as much as possible, using different terms. Who will decide whether or not Britain has an empire while the supermarket is full of groceries?

"Jersey, Guernsey, and the Isle of Man are also under the sovereignty of the British Crown, but have somewhat different constitutional relations with Great Britain and are consistently classified as Crown dependencies, and not overseas territories" [ibid.] .

Somewhat different constitutional relations. How cute. Were there “somewhat different” military relations with the Indians of America? And where are these Indians now?

Terms of darkness, it is incredibly difficult to understand. As if on purpose, everything is written in a complicated and confusing way. So it is - on purpose. The calculation is that you wave your hand and take my word for it. No, they say, the empire. Disbanded. There are only territories.

“Overseas and dependent territories should be distinguished from the Commonwealth of Nations (eng. Commonwealth of Nations), a voluntary union of former British colonies, and more recently, some other countries, such as Mozambique, joined the Commonwealth for financial and political reasons.

AT historical context the colonies that were part of Great Britain must be distinguished from the protectorates, which, while under British control, nominally retained their independence.

They should also not be confused with dominions, independent states that had equal status with Great Britain in the British Empire and, after the 1931 Statute of Westminster, in the British Commonwealth of Nations.

Crown colonies, such as Hong Kong, differed from other colonies in that they were governed directly by the Crown and did not have the autonomy that was in self-governing colonies, such as Bermuda.

In short, anyone who wants to understand the intricacies of the English world order must stock up on patience and analgin from a headache.

For those who want to get an answer right away, here it is: “At present, British Overseas Territories exist in all regions of the world - in the Caribbean (North America), the Falklands ( South America), Saint Helena in Africa, Pitcairn in Oceania, Gibraltar in Europe, the British Indian Ocean Territory in Asia, and the South Sandwich Islands in Antarctica.

What is the name of the form of government that is spread in all regions of the world? Empire. Therefore, when Russia is called an empire, there is no need to be ashamed of it. Even more confused. You just need to patiently explain that in this we are exactly the same as our "partners" the Anglo-Saxons.

And - not only they. The Republic of France also has an empire. Smaller, more modest. Democratic Empire. How does it differ from the British monarchical empire? Nothing. Is that the presence of the Constitution.

Although there is no difference - you cannot secede from the UK, because it does not have a constitution that guarantees the right to secede. It is impossible to secede from France precisely because it has a constitution that forbids secession.

Maybe the inhabitants of French Guiana do not want to separate from mainland France? They feel good - next to a weak Brazilian peso, next to a weak Surinamese dollar.

And they have a real euro in their wallets. But even the presence of a European passport and European currency does not appeal to local residents, who are only 163 thousand people in the department [www.vsesmi.ru/riews/594084].

Founded in 1981, fighting for the independence of French Guiana Political Party Guiana Liberation Front Tam-Tam (Tam-Tam Front for the Liberation of Guiana). In my opinion - fights completely in vain. No one will ever let Guiana go.

Politics, after all, is mere expediency. “From the Kourou launch site in French Guiana, a French Ariane-5 carrier rocket was launched with two satellites on board.”

France is definitely not going to lose the spaceport. But this does not prevent the French deputies of the European Parliament from making beautiful speeches about freedom and democracy and presenting the Sakharov Prize every year.

But the academician himself wrote that in the sense of "separation" "everyone should have equal rights, regardless of the number" ["Degree of Freedom" (Academician Sakharov's conversation with Grigory Tsitrinyak); www.sakharov-archive.ru].

The oldest written constitution is the US Constitution. It was worked out by a convention meeting in private in Philadelphia from May 14 to September 17, 1787. Slavery will be abolished in the States almost a hundred years after that, on February 1, 1865 [ approx. the author - at the same time, American parliamentarians were in no hurry to get rid of slavery, which was in perfect harmony with American democracy. The chronology of events is as follows. In 1860, Republican candidate Abraham Lincoln won the presidential election. After eleven southern states created their own confederate union, adopted their own Constitution, elected their president (Jefferson Davis) and determined the city of Richmond as their capital, a civil war began between the two parts of the United States in the winter of 1861. Usually, the reasons for the war are just the desire to preserve slavery among the southerners and the desire to abolish it among the northerners. On January 1, 1863, at the height of the war, President Lincoln issued a Declaration calling for the emancipation of all slaves. In the same year, 1863, the Republican Party submitted to Congress a proposal for a corresponding amendment to the US Constitution, number 13. Only on April 8, 1864, this amendment received the necessary qualified majority in the Senate. The House of Representatives voted in favor of this amendment only nine months later, on January 31, 1865. And even then only two-thirds of the votes. Historians usually attribute this to the political game of Republicans-Democrats. For us, the result is important: the democratic institutions of the United States were in such a "rush" to abolish slavery that they adopted an amendment to their Constitution for about two years.! ].

Therefore, clear signs of racism are still present in the "most democratic" constitution of the world very weighty and visible.

Directly in Article I (Section 2, paragraph 3) it says the following:

"Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the individual states which may be included in this Union, in proportion to the population, which is determined by adding to the whole number of free persons - including those who are obliged to serve for many years, and excluding those who are not taxed Indians three-fifths of all other persons.

A little further down in the same article, Section 9, paragraph 1: "The movement or importation of such persons as any of the present States may think fit to admit, shall not be prohibited by Congress before the year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but such importation may be subject to tax or duty, not exceeding ten dollars for each person.

The persons about whom in question are slaves. To this day, the US Constitution says that the white population of the southern states received additional votes in the elections in the amount of 3/5 of the number of slaves in the slave states.

That is, the slave owner was given several votes - according to the number of slaves he had [here: Constitution foreign states: Tutorial. 2nd ed. M.: BEK, 1997].

We see that in the most seemingly democratic republic, right in the first article of the Constitution, we can talk about slavery. And nothing…

Now let's go back to the good old Great Britain. We are always assured that a constitutional monarchy has been established here. However, any sane person understands that for this the country must have two things: a monarch and a constitution.

But if there is a queen in Britain, then, as we found out, there is no constitution there!

How can a monarchy be constitutional if there is no constitution? [ from the author: very often the British monarchy is called "parliamentary". This is a smarter and more subtle formulation, with which it seems difficult to argue: the parliament, unlike the constitution, is there. But as soon as you begin to immerse yourself in the structure of the parliament, it becomes clear that all this is pure slyness. A little later you will see it.].

It doesn't happen! How can you not be married without a husband. So what kind of monarchy in the UK, if not constitutional? Answer: absolute. It doesn't happen otherwise.

You either have power or you don't. It is either complete or partial. Other options in politics and state structure it just doesn't happen. We have something to compare.

There are countries in the world whose state system is officially called an absolute monarchy: Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, Brunei, Bahrain. Have you ever heard words of reproach from human rights activists, historians and Western politicians against these countries?

I did not hear. These states are considered modern and quite civilized. Meanwhile sovereignty the monarch in them is practically not limited by anything and is not distributed among other subjects of power.

Laws are issued in the name of the monarch, and the entire administrative apparatus of the state is subordinate to him. In other words, an absolute monarchy provides the head of state with all the fullness of the highest legislative, executive and judicial power.

Let's take Qatar as an example. According to the Constitution of Qatar, all legislative and executive power belongs to the head of state - the emir. Who, it is true, is elected from his midst by the male members ruling family Al Thani.

The emir has many powers:

* he represents the state in foreign relations;

* is an supreme commander armed forces of Qatar,
forms the Defense Council;

* appoints and dismisses civil and military employees;

* by his decree can cancel any decision of the court;

* can directly lead the government as prime minister;

* if he is not prime minister himself, he appoints ministers on the recommendation
Prime Minister, and at his discretion, may at any time remove
them from their positions.

These are the powers of an absolute monarch.

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What does Africa give to the world? Only AIDS. Author - Kevin Myers

100 Great Wars Sokolov Boris Vadimovich

WAR FOR THE INDEPENDENCE OF THE BRITISH COLONIES IN NORTH AMERICA (1775-1783)

WAR FOR THE INDEPENDENCE OF THE BRITISH COLONIES IN NORTH AMERICA

(1775–1783)

The war of British possessions on the territory of the current United States for independence from the mother country.

The fighting began in 1775 after the American colonies refused to pay new taxes to the British treasury, the so-called "stamp duty" on all printed publications in America, from legal documents to playing cards, established without consulting them. In the colonies, the opinion of the English philosopher John Locke was very popular, who argued that “the purpose of the state is the protection of property ... The sovereign or parliament cannot have the power to take all or part of the property of subjects without their consent, otherwise this will be a denial of all property.”

The colonies declared a boycott of English goods, and the "stamp tax" law failed. No more successful was the attempt to introduce customs duties here. In 1773, a large shipment of cheap Indian tea was delivered to Boston, which, however, included a small customs duty. On December 16, opponents of the British crown, disguised as Indians, attacked the ships and drowned all the cargo. This event became known as the Boston Tea Party. Since that time, increased armament of the militia in the colonies began and it became clear that an armed clash could not be avoided.

The thirteen colonies of the Atlantic coast convened a continental congress, which, effective December 1, 1774, prohibited the importation of any goods from England. At the same time, approximately 30 percent of the population of the colonies remained loyal to the British king. They were called "Loyalists". It was the loyalists who became allies of the British troops in the war that began soon.

The first battle took place on April 19, 1775 at Concord and Lexington in Massachusetts. The English detachment moved to Concord to disarm the local militias and seize the armory. At Lexington, he was ambushed by the militia. Breaking through the discordant fire of the colonists, the British reached Concord, where they ransacked the houses of the townsfolk (the warehouse had been almost completely emptied the previous day). The soldiers then came under fire from the militias and retreated. There were several dead and wounded on both sides.

Reinforcements arrived for the militias. Their number reached 2 thousand. The British began to retreat, fired on from all sides by the enemy. The light British infantry moved behind the militia lines, trying to shoot them at close range. In Lexington, the English detachment had already lost all control, turning into a crowd, but here help approached them. However, the ranks of the militia were replenished with new volunteers.

The exhausting British retreat ended at Charlestown, where they finally found themselves under the protection of the guns of the Royal Navy. British losses were 73 killed, 26 missing and 174 wounded. The Americans lost 49 killed, 5 missing and 41 wounded. Professional hunters from among the colonists shot clearly better than the soldiers of the British regular army.

The next major battle took place at Bunker Hill on June 17, 1775. The British took revenge for Concord, but failed to lift the siege of Boston. Congress soon created the Continental Army, which was led in July by George Washington, a Virginia militia officer who had experience fighting with the British against the French in Canada. He captured Fort Tyconderoga, placed the guns captured there on the heights around Boston and forced the British to withdraw from the city with continuous shelling. On July 4, 1776, the Philadelphia Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, which declared the thirteen colonies to secede from the British crown.

In the autumn of 1775, the Americans invaded the Canadian province of Quebec, hoping to raise its population against British rule. In November, American General Richard Montgomery occupied the city of Montreal, and in December, together with another general, Benedict Arnold, who later defected to the British, unsuccessfully stormed the city of Quebec. In the spring of 1776, British troops drove the Americans out of the borders of Canada, whose population was by no means eager to join the American Revolution, fearing that their country would be swallowed up by their southern neighbor.

British troops besieged New York. In November 1776, Washington's army was defeated here and retreated to Pennsylvania. The general had no more than 3 thousand soldiers left, while the British had 34 thousand troops. But Washington on Christmas night 1776 made a surprise attack on the English garrison in Trenton and captured 900 people - mostly from among German mercenaries.

For almost the entirety of 1777 and the following year, 1778, both sides largely maneuvered without entering into a pitched battle. British troops advanced through the southern states, while Washington's army remained in the north - near the borders of the British-occupied state of New York, where loyalist sentiments were strong. The only success of the Americans was the fighting in Saratoga. The army of British General John Barjoyne was surrounded and on October 17, 1777 laid down their arms. The defeat of the British was facilitated by the fact that they had insufficient supplies of food and gunpowder and were not prepared for military operations in difficult-to-pass forests. However, the combat effectiveness of the American army was also largely undermined by the hard winter of 1777/78 at the main camp at Valley Forge northwest of Philadelphia. Then many soldiers of the Continental Army died from hunger, cold and disease.

In the summer of 1778 there was a fundamental change in the international position of the United States. France, hoping to regain its possessions in Canada and India, declared war on England and entered into an alliance with the rebellious colonies. Subsidies from the French treasury helped the Americans to arm the army and significantly increase its numbers. This led to the success of the Continental Army. The position of the Americans was further strengthened when Spain declared war on England in June 1779, and Holland in December 1780. The combined Franco-Spanish fleet threatened to land troops on the British Isles. The Spanish laid siege to Gibraltar and captured the island of Menorca. The British government was increasingly not up to the North American colonies.

In 1779, General George Roger Clark drove the British troops out of the northwest and took control of the Frontier area - border areas with Indian tribes. The decisive campaign unfolded in 1780 in North and South Carolina. Here success was at first on the side of the British. British troops under General Charles Cornwallis occupied Charleston and defeated the Americans at the Battle of Camden on August 16, 1780. After that, the states of North and South Carolina came under British control. Only small partisan detachments of "patriots", as the supporters of independence called themselves, continued to attack the British soldiers.

However, on October 7, 1780, American troops under the command of General Nathaniel Green won a victory at King Mountain. The British were forced to leave the territory of both Carolinas, except for Charleston, and retreat to Yorktown in Virginia, where they were blocked by the French fleet under the command of Admiral de Grasse. In September 1781, the 11,000th army of Washington, supported by the 6,000th French army of General Jean Baptiste Rochambeau, broke through the defenses of the defenders of Yorktown. On October 19, 1781, having lost about 300 people from enemy artillery fire, Cornwallis capitulated with an army of 8,000 and 144 guns. Allied casualties were 88 Americans and 186 French. Thus, the number of British troops in North America decreased by a quarter.

The military operations on this actually ended. The French government no longer intended to keep significant contingents of its army and navy in this secondary theater of operations for it, and without French support, the Americans could not continue active hostilities.

The peace between the United States and England was signed in Paris on November 30, 1782, and was then confirmed by the final peace treaty between France and England in Paris on September 3, 1783. England recognized the independence of her colonies in North America, but retained Canada. By the end of 1783, British troops had left US territory. The American government pledged not to obstruct English creditors in recovering pre-war debts from American citizens, and Congress promised to "genuinely recommend" the return of confiscated Loyalist (or Tory, as the Patriots) property. This last promise remained empty. Up to 50,000 loyalists who fought on the side of England left the United States along with British troops, forced to abandon all their real estate. Together with family members, the total number of refugees exceeded 100 thousand people. Approximately the same number of runaway Negro slaves left the colonies with the British. France received the British islands of Tobago and Santa Lucia and five of its colonial cities in India. Spain acquired Menorca and Florida.

American losses in the Revolutionary War were 4,000 killed and died of wounds and disease. British losses in this war were about the same. In addition, several thousand British and French soldiers died during the fighting in Europe, North America and India, fighting against each other. The Spanish army also suffered small losses, hardly more than a few hundred people.

As a result of the war for the independence of the British colonies in North America, a state was born that is now the most powerful in the world both in terms of accumulated national wealth and in terms of economic and military potential.

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The English period and the War of Independence (1665–1783) So, in 1664, the Dutch city of New Amsterdam, together with the entire province of New Netherland, was captured by the British and renamed New York (New York) in honor of the Duke of York and Albany. The edge has moved from

site recalls the greatness of the British Empire

The richest British colony was India - it was an Empire within an Empire. At first, colonization was carried out by the establishment created by decree of Elizabeth I in 1600. East India Company. Under the authority of the crown, Indian possessions were transferred only in 1876: after the first war for the country's independence, Queen Victoria was crowned as Empress of India. It was a colony with the most large population, which, along with independent states, participated in the First World War and became one of the founders of the League of Nations. With all this, locals were seriously limited in civil and political rights. In 1916, the colonial authorities in India considered it a great concession to allow Indians to hold officer positions. Only in 1947, when the country was engulfed in mass demonstrations, which were accompanied by riots and bloodshed, Britain announced the withdrawal of its forces. On August 14, the dominion of Pakistan was founded, and the next day, the independence of India was declared.

Currency of British Egypt. 10 millimeters 1916

British troops controlled Egypt from late XIX in. At first, the occupation was presented as a fight against the growth of nationalism and support for the local Turkish administration. When Britain and the Ottoman Empire were at war in 1914, London declared a protectorate over Egypt. The khedive's governor was overthrown, and the sultan became his successor. These were the years of the parade of independences and the final collapse of colonial empires. Already in 1922, London officially recognized the sovereignty of Cairo, Sultan Fuad I proclaimed himself king. The new monarchy, by the way, did not last long. In 1952, a baby was on the throne, the country demanded reforms - it was overdue revolutionary situation as a result of which Egypt was proclaimed a republic.

Royal Act of Canadian Confederation

Loyalty to the crown against the backdrop of the war for the independence of the American colonies was preserved, in particular, by Quebec, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. Loyalists actively fled here after the defeat. It is noteworthy that it was Canada at the height of the Napoleonic Wars that became the springboard for the war between England and the United States. Nevertheless, there were many problems with this colony - this is the issue of assimilation of the French-speaking part of the population, and the economic weakness of the region, which mid-nineteenth in. accumulated huge debts. Gradually, Canada gained independence. After the formation of the United States, she received the right to elect her own parliament, then a dominion was created. It was not yet a separate state, but the right to form its own government appeared. In 1919 Canada joined the League of Nations, and since 1931 it has been formally relieved of the obligation to comply with the decisions of the British Parliament. But London could change the country's constitution for a long time and interfere in the life of the dominion.

The most successful European colonial project was the Cape Colony in South Africa. It was founded in the middle of the 17th century. Dutch East India Company, in Great Britain entrenched in the region in early XIX century - having recaptured Cape Town from the Netherlands. London needed these lands primarily to control by sea to Indonesia and India. Subsequently, rich deposits of platinum, gold and diamonds were discovered. Because of this, unlike many other colonies, South Africa brought the metropolis a very serious income. The export of resources was accompanied by particularly severe suppression of the local population. Blacks didn't even have the right to vote for a long time. In 1910, the newly formed Union of South Africa was declared a dominion, and independence was proclaimed only in 1961. These were the years of maximum tension in racial relations in the country. Discrimination was enshrined in laws that, despite international pressure, persisted until the early 1990s. Only in 1994 were the first general elections held.

One of major areas for the British Empire in the XVII - XVIII centuries. was North America. More than two dozen colonies were created here, which attracted Europeans looking for new life, adventurers, idealists and enterprising people. There are various estimates of how large the crown's income from these territories was. These were, of course, not the ruins of the Latin American Indian empires, which for a long time provided Spain with gold and through it all of Europe. Nevertheless, for these colonies, the United Kingdom led a long and bloody war which went down in history as the American War of Independence. The union of thirteen colonies sought the rights to self-government and opposed the introduction of regular taxes in favor of the mother country. The conflict escalated when the British Parliament rejected these demands and pointedly set new fees. In 1775, royal officials were expelled from the colonies. A war began that lasted more than eight years and claimed the lives of tens of thousands of people. The inhabitants of the colonies defended their right to independence and the creation of the United States.

The first colonies in North America were created in early XVII in. immigrants from England, Holland, France. The influx of English colonists, mainly from among the radical Protestants - Puritans, became especially massive every year. The first English settlement in North America was founded in 1607 and named after the "Virgin Queen" Elizabeth Tudor - Virginia (from the English virgin - virgin). In 1620, the Mayflower ship (" May flower") landed in the northern part of Virginia a group of 102 "Pilgrim Fathers" - Puritans who fled from religious persecution. Later, the city of New Plymouth will be built here. Gradually, 13 colonies were formed on the Atlantic coast, the population of which was 2.5 million people.

The Indians, who belonged to the unions of the Iroquois and Algonquin tribes, initially treated the colonists friendly. It was the Indians who taught the newcomers to sow maize and tobacco, peas and beans, grow pumpkins and squash, melons and cucumbers, and make canoes from birch bark (without these canoes one would never have been able to penetrate the wild thickets). It can be firmly said that the Indians taught the Europeans to live in the New World. And those, as a "sign of gratitude," took away the lands from the Indians, began to seize the forests in which the Indians, who did not have livestock, hunted, bought the most valuable furs from the Indians for rum and factory goods.

In the colonies of New England (north of the Atlantic coast), small-scale farming became predominant. Gradually, the handicraft industry associated with it grew, and in the second half of the 17th century. manufactories appeared (spinning, weaving, ironworks, etc.). The formation of new classes, the bourgeoisie and hired workers, proceeded rapidly.

AT southern colonies a different type of economy emerged. Here landowners founded extensive plantations of cotton, tobacco and rice. The lack of labor force led to the massive importation of Negro slaves. The working conditions of the Negroes were intolerable. American plantation slavery represented a resurgence of slave-owning methods of exploitation under the emerging capitalist order.

The colonies were ruled from England. The king personally appointed the governors of most of the colonies. There were bicameral colonial assemblies, and the property qualification for voters was very high.

The common territory, economic and economic interests of the colonies, language, and religion laid the foundations of a new nation, the core of which is considered to be the Vesps (from the English. Wasp - a white Anglo-Saxon Protestant).

The first ideologist of American bourgeois society was Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790), philosopher, politician, scientist and economist, later ambassador of the independent United States to France.

The king, landed aristocracy, merchants and entrepreneurs of England sought to increase the profits that the possession of the colonies gave. They exported valuable raw materials from there - furs, cotton, and imported finished goods, collected taxes and duties. The English Parliament introduced many prohibitions in the colonies, artificially hindering their economic development. In 1763, the king issued a decree forbidding the colonists to move further west, beyond the Allegheny Mountains. This measure deprived planters of the opportunity to move from depleted lands to new, more fertile ones. The interests of small tenants who wanted to move to the west and become independent farmers there were also affected. The stamp duty introduced by the metropolis (1765) was especially pernicious: when buying any goods, for issuing newspapers, processing documents, etc., one had to pay a tax. These measures sparked a massive protest movement.

In 1773, the inhabitants of Boston attacked English ships in the port and threw overboard bales of tea, which had risen in price enormously due to taxes. In response, the British authorities closed the port of Boston. In 1774, the Continental Congress, which met in Philadelphia, proclaimed the natural rights of the colonists to "life, liberty, and property."

The armed struggle began in the spring of 1775. The creation of a regular American army and the fighting was led by the Virginia planter George Washington (1732-1799).
On July 4, 1776, Congress in Philadelphia passed the Declaration of Independence drawn up by the lawyer Thomas Jefferson. Thus, the creation of a new state was proclaimed - the United States of America, which initially consisted of 13 states.

The War of Independence continued for several more years. During the war, which took on the character of a bourgeois revolution, the population of the colonies was divided into two camps: patriots - representatives of the emerging national bourgeoisie and loyalists, vitally connected with the interests of the British crown. France, which was interested in weakening its eternal rival, England, provided effective assistance to the Americans. In 1781, the main forces of the British army surrendered to the Americans and the French near Yorktown.

In 1783, a peace treaty was signed, according to which England recognized the formation of the United States. In 1787, the United States adopted a constitution, which at that time became perhaps the most progressive in the world. It was supplemented by the "Bill of Rights", which declared the basic bourgeois freedoms. A bourgeois-democratic republic was established in the USA. The War of Independence destroyed all the obstacles that hampered the development of industry and trade.