Colonial America Quiz

Following the Seven Years' War, how did Choctaw leader Alibamo Mingo view the transition of power from the French to the English?

He hoped the English would settle quickly and bountifully supply his people's wants, as the French had done.

What was the primary immediate cause of the French and Indian War starting in 1754?

British American colonists were encroaching on land in the Ohio River Valley claimed by the French.

In her 1741 letter to her father, what agricultural commodity did Eliza Lucas lament losing due to an early frost in South Carolina?

Indigo

What was the primary reason the colonial legislature in Virginia standardized tobacco as a form of exchange?

To act as commodity money due to a lack of British currency

What specific grievance did Samson Occom express regarding his treatment as an ordained minister and missionary?

He was paid significantly less than white missionaries despite doing the same amount of work, if not more.

Which Great Awakening itinerant preacher was famous for traveling the eastern seaboard and could reportedly bring audiences to tears just by pronouncing the word "Mesopotamia"?

George Whitefield

What shocked Boston trader Sarah Knight about the behavior of Connecticut farmers toward their enslaved laborers?

The farmers permitted too great familiarity, allowing enslaved people to sit at the table and eat with them.

What concept described the British Parliament's unofficial policy of loosely enforcing trade laws (like the Navigation Acts) prior to the end of the Seven Years' War?

Salutary neglect

What does Gibson Clough's war journal primarily reveal about the British regular army during the Seven Years' War?

It maintained brutal physical discipline, regularly executing soldiers and issuing hundreds of lashes.

According to the prophet Neolin, whose message was spread by Pontiac, what did the Master of Life instruct Native Americans to do?

Drive the whites out of their country, make war on them, and return to traditional ways.

Young Virginia militia officer who attacked Fort Duquesne in 1754.

George Washington

Proposed the Albany Plan of Union in 1754 to coordinate colonial defenses.

Benjamin Franklin

Enlightenment philosopher who championed the idea of natural rights.

John Locke

English minister who took in and educated the Mohegan convert Samson Occom.

Eleazar Wheelock

Northampton minister whose revival sermons, focusing on inward grace and divine wrath, sparked violent convulsions in his congregation.

Jonathan Edwards

Minister who authored the preface to "Early Piety" in 1711, asking "What did our forefathers come into this wilderness for?"

Increase Mather

Native American prophet who received a vision from the Master of Life urging a return to traditional rituals and rejection of European goods.

Neolin

Extremist itinerant preacher who alienated many by encouraging his followers to burn books and dance naked at night.

James Davenport

A conflict ending in 1729 where Indigenous people in Louisiana expelled the French due to trade disputes and exploitation of forced labor.

Natchez War

1770 event where British soldiers fired into a harassing crowd, killing colonists; the soldiers were later defended by John Adams.

Boston Massacre

A 1739 uprising where a group of enslaved people in South Carolina marched toward Spanish Florida seeking freedom.

Stono Rebellion

A major uprising by Indigenous peoples in the Great Lakes region against the British following the end of the Seven Years' War.

Pontiacs War

Kept British soldiers stationed in the colonies and forced colonists to provide housing and food for them.

Quartering act

Forbade colonists from migrating west across the Appalachian Mountains following Pontiac's War.

Proclamation of 1763

Prohibited colonial assemblies from printing their own paper money, worsening economic uncertainty.

Currency Act

Levied a direct tax on all paper items produced in the colonies, including newspapers and legal contracts.

Stamp Act

A specific term used by Connecticut merchants to describe purchasing goods with provisions at a discounted assembly-set rate.

Pay as money

The practice of seizing men, often against their will, and forcing them to serve in the Royal Navy.

Impressment

The British argument that members of Parliament represented the interests of all British subjects, regardless of where they lived.

Virtual Representation

A labor system common on South Carolina rice plantations where enslaved people were given specific jobs to complete in a day.

Task System

The Declaratory Act of 1766 affirmed Parliament's absolute right to pass laws for the colonies in all cases whatsoever, even as it repealed the Stamp Act.

True

The Enlightenment was an intellectual movement that emphasized religious revelation and strict adherence to tradition over scientific inquiry and rational thinking.

False

The Albany Plan of Union, proposed by Benjamin Franklin, was enthusiastically accepted and successfully implemented by all the colonial delegates to fund a unified army against the French.

False

In his 1741 sermon in Enfield, Connecticut, Jonathan Edwards compared humans to a spider or loathsome insect being held over a fire by an angry God.

True

By 1750, slavery was legally banned in all Mid-Atlantic and New England colonies.

False