24 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: Continental regiments are notoriously desperate for gunpowder, but they’re also desperate for bullets: Elbridge Gerry tells us that “The Committee of this City are collecting all the Window Weights of Lead in the same &c replacing them with Iron.”

24 MAY 1776, BROOKLYN: Nathanael Greene writes to John Adams, recommending that the Congress offer support to Continental soldiers maimed or killed, to “inspire those engaged with as much courage as any measure that can be fixed upon.”

24 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: John Hancock, president of the Congress, writes to Continental leaders in upstate New York and Canada, stressing that failing to save the collapsing Continental invasion of Canada would be a disaster for the war effort:

24 MAY 1776, NEW YORK: Doctor Azor Betts is “committed to the Gaol of this City” indefinitely for inoculating four Continental Army officers with smallpox, in violation of both the laws of the provincial congress and Washington’s orders to the army against inoculation.

24 MAY 1776, LACHINE, QUEBEC: “That morning dawns—that morn big with the fate of a few, a handful of brave fellows. I shall do my part—but remember, if I fall I am sacrificed,” writes 19-year-old Continental Army Captain James Wilkinson as he prepares for his first battle.

24 MAY 1776, LONDON: In conversation with Sir George Hay, Massachusetts Loyalist Thomas Hutchinson, despised as a creature of Parliament, admits that “I did not approve of the Stamp Act” of 1765, beginning the friction between the Thirteen Colonies and the imperial government,

23 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: It is almost certainly today, the day of her arrival in the town, that Martha Washington is inoculated with smallpox.

23 MAY 1776, FORT JOHNSTON, NORTH CAROLINA: In a raging storm, Patriots attack the redcoat detachment from Lord Cornwallis’s fleet that have reoccupied North Carolina’s only significant military installation, but are defeated.

23 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: A congressional committee, including Benjamin Harrison, John Adams and Richard Henry Lee, begins a conference with George Washington & Horatio Gates to determine if there’s anything that can be done to salvage the Continental Army’s invasion of Canada.

23 MAY 1776, FREDERICKSBURG, NEW YORK (modern Patterson): Ensign Duncan Campbell, a redcoat officer captured in Canada and released on parole, writes to George Washington after the Dutchess County committee refuses to allow him to travel to New Jersey. founders.archives.gov/documents/Wa...

23 MAY 1776, LONDON: Parliament rises for its summer recess. Thomas Hutchinson’s son, just arrived as a refugee having been in Boston throughout the siege, is able to attend the House of Lords as Lord Gower’s guest to hear King George III’s speech for the prorogation.

22 MAY 1776, WILLIAMSBURG: The Virginia committee of safety and Major General Charles Lee send letters to the senior Spanish colonial officials in the Americas requesting Spanish aid in the war against Great Britain: www.gilderlehrman.org/spanish-infl...

Ca. 20-25 MAY 1776, WILLIAMSBURG, VIRGINIA: George Mason authors the first draft of Virginia’s Declaration of Rights, including that the only acceptable constraint on religious liberty is the prevention of forcing one’s own religious precepts upon others: founders.archives.gov/documents/Ma...

22 MAY 1776, NEW YORK: The Continental Army’s daily orders list the names (and locations) of the artillery emplacements around New York: the Grand, Whitehall, Oyster, Grenadier, Jersey & Waterbury’s Batteries; the Bayard’s Hill, Spencer’s and Badlam’s Redoubts; and Fort George.

22 MAY 1776, LONDON: Lord North reassures the House of Commons that the Howe brothers’ powers as peace commissioners in America allow them only “not to treat, but to confer, and to sound, for grounds of peace,” and that any settlement will require Parliament’s approval.

21 MAY 1776, ANNAPOLIS: The Maryland provincial convention reacts to Congress’s recommendation that colonies create their own governments by repeating that they remain opposed to any measure supporting independence & making peace with the Crown less likely.

21 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: The Continental Congress passes formal regulations on the treatment of prisoners of war, including the text of the oath captured officers must sign in order to be allowed to live at liberty on parole.

21 MAY 1776, NEW YORK: George Washington departs, having been summoned to Philadelphia to confer with the Continental Congress on the state of the war effort. Israel Putnam is placed in command of fortifying the town during his absence.

21 MAY 1776, LES CÈDRES, QUEBEC: Having already captured the Continental outpost, the force of Mississauga, Iroquois, Canadian militia & redcoats, whose number includes Joseph Brant, defeat American reinforcements sent to rescue the garrison. www.pc.gc.ca/apps/dfhd/pa...

21 MAY 1776, UTRECHT: Charles-Guillaume-Frédéric Dumas writes to Congress’s committee of secret correspondence that “the king [of France]'s mediation cannot take place as long as the colonies are subject to the king of England.” founders.archives.gov/documents/Fr...

20 MAY 1776, PORT EGMONT, FALKLAND ISLANDS: British personnel leave their settlement in the Falkland Islands, leaving the islands uninhabited, but they leave behind a plaque announcing that Britain is not abandoning her claim to the islands.

20 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: Maryland delegate Thomas Stone summarizes the arguments of Congress’s anti-independence faction, that John Adams’s diary has repeatedly characterized as being simply to delay and deflect from the real issue:

20 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: Georgia joins the Continental Congress, bringing the number of colonies represented to thirteen. Lyman Hall and Button Gwinnett present their credentials and are accepted into the Congress.

20 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: “The Weather was very rainy, and the Meeting was in the Open Air, like the Comitia of the Romans”: A town meeting meets in a rainstorm to react to the Continental Congress’s recommendation that the colonies create their own governments.

20 MAY 1776, NEW YORK: George Washington forbids Continental soldiers from being inoculated against smallpox: founders.archives.gov/documents/Wa...

19 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: “We shall have a severe trial this summer with Britons, Hessians, Hanoverians, Indians, negroes and every other butcher the gracious King of Britain can hire against us,” writes New Hampshire delegate Josiah Bartlett to John Langdon.

19 MAY 1776, BOSTON HARBOR: Two days after his daring capture of the ammunition ship Hope makes him a hero, James Mugford, Jr., sailing master of the Continental ship Franklin, is killed in action: www.usni.org/magazines/na...

19 MAY 1776, LES CÈDRES, QUEBEC: The Continental garrison surrenders to the force of Mississauga, Iroquois, Canadian militia and redcoats after a day’s siege. American sources seem united that the surrender is “a most infamous Piece of Cowardice” by the fort’s commander, Major Butterfield:

18 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: New York Continental Congress delegate James Duane worries that Congress’s resolution calling on colonies to create their own governments will alienate the middle colonies with its radicalism, splintering American unity: founders.archives.gov/documents/Ja...

18 MAY 1776, NEW YORK: As many of the Tories who originally fled town start to return, the committee of safety begins interviewing them, disarming them and demanding oaths of loyalty:

18 MAY 1776, ALBANY, NEW YORK: Newly arrived Brigadier General John Sullivan writes to George Washington that he’s discovered that two Continental regiments drawing pay and provisions from Congress don’t actually seem to exist: founders.archives.gov/documents/Wa...

18 MAY 1776, LES CÈDRES, QUEBEC: A force consisting reportedly of forty redcoats, a hundred Canadian militia, and five hundred Mississauga and Iroquois led by Thayendanegea, or Joseph Brant, begins a siege of a Continental defensive emplacement. www.pc.gc.ca/apps/dfhd/pa...

17 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: Anti-independence Virginia delegate Carter Braxton relates how the aggressive preamble written by John Adams turned Congress’s resolution (recommending colonies create their own governments) into a more radical document than was intended:

17 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: On a congressionally-mandated day of fasting and prayer, John Adams attends a sermon drawing “a Parrallell between the Case of Israel and that of America, and between the Conduct of Pharaoh and that of George.” founders.archives.gov/documents/Ad...

17 MAY 1776, BOSTON HARBOR: The capture of a Royal Navy storeship carrying 75 tons of desperately needed gunpowder and a thousand carbine muskets sees a new naval hero of the Continental cause created, a few days before he’s killed in action. www.usni.org/magazines/na...

17 MAY 1776, MONTREAL: “I am at a Loss to express my Astonishmt. at the Conduct of Congress,” writes Samuel Chase, one of Congress’s ambassadors to Canada, of Congress’s decision to send an army of invasion into Canada but failing to properly supply it.

17 MAY 1776, LONDON: “The American war begins to lose its popularity,” Horace Walpole writes to Sir Horace Mann, British representative in Tuscany. News has recently arrived of the fall of Boston: “Great pains were taken, and no wonder, to soften this disgrace.”

16 MAY 1776, WILLIAMSBURG, VIRGINIA: A public celebration is held in honor of yesterday’s vote by the provincial convention to instruct Virginia’s Continental Congress delegates to move to declare independence:

16 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: Hearing that Martha Washington intends to come to Philadelphia to be inoculated against smallpox, John Hancock writes to George Washington offer his own residence for her to recuperate: founders.archives.gov/documents/Wa...

16 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: The Continental Congress’s decision to promote Horatio Gates to major general sets off a rivalry between Gates and Philip Schuyler that, John Adams claims, is the root of his own rivalry with Alexander Hamilton a generation later: founders.archives.gov/documents/Ad...

16 MAY 1776, PERTH AMBOY, NEW JERSEY: Colonel Benjamin Tupper writes to George Washington of his efforts to apprehend Tories who are communicating with the British warships lurking outside New York Harbor: founders.archives.gov/documents/Wa...

15 MAY 1776, WILLIAMSBURG, VIRGINIA: “We have no alternative left but an abject submission to the will of those over-bearing tyrants, or a total separation from the crown and government of Great Britain”: The provincial convention instructs its congressional delegates to seek independence.

15 MAY 1776, ANNAPOLIS: The Maryland Convention abolishes oaths of allegiance to the King. Since some nominees have been reluctant to accept offices requiring an oath of allegiance during hostilities, the Convention says a simple oath of office will suffice.

15 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: “It appears absolutely irreconcileable to reason, and good Conscience, for the People of these Colonies now to take the Oaths and Affirmations necessary for the support of any Government under the Crown of Great Britain,” declares Congress.

14 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: “It is impossible to tell how long the War may last; And no prudent man would choose to Trust himself long, without the Security of a regular Established Government,” Caesar Rodney writes of the necessity to create independent executives & judiciaries.

14 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: The Continental Congress permit Benjamin Church, held under constant guard in Connecticut since his discovery and arrest during the Siege of Boston, to be returned to Massachusetts and released on parole until his trial.

14 MAY 1776, FAIRFIELD, CONNECTICUT: The local committee write to George Washington with details on a Tory conspiracy in southeast Connecticut: founders.archives.gov/documents/Wa...

14 MAY 1776, PARIS: “Nothing at the moment could justify any war that the two powers [France and Spain] could undertake against England,” the French foreign minister, Vergennes, writes to the French ambassador to Spain.

13 MAY 1776, SAVANNAH RIVER, GEORGIA: Apprised by the Patriots they captured yesterday of an armed schooner lurking upriver hoping to attack them, a small Royal Navy force goes upriver, surprises the schooner and captures her instead.

13 MAY 1776, PHILADELPHIA: When he publishes his grandfather’s diary, John Adams’s grandson Charles Francis Adams will excise John’s entire entry for today, regarding a petition of the spy Benjamin Church: