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The holiday commemorates the evacuation of British forces from the city of Boston following the siege of Boston, early in the American Revolutionary War. Schools and government offices are closed. If March 17 falls on a weekend, schools and government offices are closed on the following Monday in observance.
The siege of Boston (April 19, 1775 – March 17, 1776) was the opening phase of the American Revolutionary War. [5] In the siege, American patriot militia led by newly-installed Continental Army commander George Washington prevented the British Army, which was garrisoned in Boston, from moving by land.
General William Howe, commander of the British forces occupying Boston, planned an attack to dislodge them. However, after a snowstorm prevented its execution, Howe withdrew instead. British forces, accompanied by Loyalists who had fled to the city during the siege, evacuated the city on March 17 and sailed to Halifax, Nova Scotia.
William Dalrymple commanded British troops in Boston when 3-400 civilians provoked 8 soldiers into firing their muskets without orders, killing five. Patriots subsequently publicized it heavily as the "Boston Massacre". He served as quartermaster general of the British Army in North America from 1779 to 1783.
The Boston campaign was the opening campaign of the American Revolutionary War, taking place primarily in the Province of Massachusetts Bay.The campaign began with the Battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, in which the local colonial militias interdicted a British government attempt to seize military stores and leaders in Concord, Massachusetts.
Washington brought in artillery and forced the British out as the patriots took full control of Boston. The American victory on March 17, 1776, is celebrated as Evacuation Day. The city has preserved and celebrated its revolutionary past, from the harboring of the USS Constitution to the many famous sites along the Freedom Trail.
In the winter of 1775–1776, Henry Knox directed the transportation of the guns of Ticonderoga to Boston. The guns were placed upon Dorchester Heights overlooking the besieged city and the British ships in the harbor, prompting the British to evacuate their troops and Loyalist supporters from the city in March 1776. [54]
In April 1775, colonial forces barricaded Boston Neck in the Siege of Boston, including the Common and the Liberty Tree. Only British troops and a small number of Loyalist merchants remained on the Neck, and sometime between August 28 and 31, [ 9 ] a party of Loyalists led by Nathaniel Coffin Jr. [ 10 ] or by Job Williams cut down the tree and ...