General sites with numerous documents, images, and scholarly articles:

http://odur.let.rug.nl/---A very large site with perhaps the largest existing compilation of documents about the American Revolution. See, e.g.:
      • Seven Years' War
      • Boston Tea Party, Boston Massacre, Stamp Act
      • Tom Paine writings
      • Articles of Confederation
      • Documents about loyalists
      • Albany Plan
      • Correspondence during the revolutionary war
      • Journal of A. Waldo, a war surgeon
www.longman.awl.com/nash/ --- a long, good site that gives you maps, quizzes, links to other sites, study guides for your textbook, etc.

www.nara.gov/education/cc/main.html --- images of the American Revolution, including maps

www.americanrevoluton.org---has numerous letters, excerpts from documents, journals of soldiers, etc. see, e.g.,
      • the Journal of Daniel Flohr
      • the Journal of Deorge Ewing (linked from this site)
      • documents about black loyalists
      • stories from the front
      • George Washington letters from Trenton
      • Letters from spies
      • Tom Paine's Common Sense
      • Nonimportation agreements
      • Articles of Confederation
      • The Newburgh Address
      • The Paris Peace Treaty
      • Autobiography of Ben Franklin
      • And more . . .


www.earlyamerica.com---mostly visual materials, some of which are printable. See, also, "notable women of early America", including short bios of Molly Pitcher, Abigail Adams, Mercy Otis Warren, and other. This is not as full and rich a site as others -- it used to be much larger, and seems to be under construction recently.

www.revolution.h-net.msu.edu

www.clements.umich.edu/spies/---some good letters from spies are reproduced at this site.

The Avalon Project (http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/avalon.htm)--- a treasure trove of documents! From earliest foundings to the present. On the American Revolution, see, for example:

      • An Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery, 1780
      • Paine, The American Crisis
      • Alien and Sedition Acts
      • Barbary Treaties
      • Albany Plan
      • Constitutions and Charters of all colonies and states
      • The Federalist Papers
      • Documents of diplomacy and foreign affairs
      • Opinions on the Constitutionality of the BUS
      • Treaties with Native Americans
      • Documents of the Whiskey Rebellion

www.ushistory.org---numerous branches within the site, including "odur" ; see esp:

      • Valley Forge links,
      • Diary of Albigence Waldo
www.historyplace.com---for everything from Stamp Act to Congresses, Tea Parties, Patrick Henry, etc. has the best timelines for the Revolution, too

For the Stamp Act, see Colonial Williamsburg's called "Teaching Resources" for documents and commentary that cover both north and south during 1765.

www.law.umkc.edu --for valuable information about the Boston Massacre, and a complete transcription of the depositions of witnesses, the trial testimony, and biographies of key players in this event. Good pictures as well. This is the best site on the event.

www.bostonteaparty.nl/---for a pretty good site on this event. There are no excellent ones, but some prove adequate.

http://anza.uoregon.edu/archives.html -- California and Oregon during the 1770s, much of it in Spanish; timelines, biographies, maps, diaries and letters of two expeditions of the Spanish to colonize California in 1774-1776

www.msstate.edu/archives/history --- many different topics, mostly revolution era

www.memory.loc.gov/ --- Library of Congress collections; some excerpts from Jefferson and Washington papers, and from other early republic events.

www.fisher.lib.virgina.edu -- early census data

www.libertynet.org -- revolutionary era and its aftermath; esp. from collections of the David Library of the Amer. Rev.

www.h-net.msu.eduwww.state.de.uswww.oup.usa.org/anb  -- American National Biography

www.digitalhistory.org --- good documents on the 7 Years' War and Revolution beginnings; excellent place to read about daily life of soldier; includes some items related to life inside a fort on the frontier during the 7 Years' War.

www.ccs.neu.edu/home/bcortez/revwar --- mostly military history

www.lives/gwlife/ -- Washington biography; use to link to other bios of the era's leaders

www.accessible.com --- to sample the Pennsylvania Gazette on line

http://teachpol.tcnj.edu --- excellent trove of graphics on the Rev.

www.angelfire.com --- esp. good on the economics of the Rev.

www.plpsd.mb.ca/amhs/history -- links to many events, and esp. good on Loyalists

http://memory.loc.gov/ammen/gwhtml/---For the complete Library of Congress collection of George Washington Papers; the original and first part of the released papers included his writings through 1799, a great source for teaching how to use documents in multiple different ways.


For post-Revolutionary years:


http://odur.let.rug.nl/
---Washington's Farewell Address

      • Important Court Cases of the early republic
      • Monroe Doctrine
      • Marbury v. Madison, 1803
      • McCulloch v. Maryland, 1819
      • Dartmouth College case, 1819
      • Jefferson's inaugural address
      • Treaties, bill of rights, northwest ordinances, etc.

www.nara.gov/education/cc/main.html --- Eli Whitney's Patent for the Cotton Gin

      • The Lewis and Clark Expedition
      • Anti-Railroad Posters

www.constitution.org --- many constitutions of states and governments; Federalist debates, Con Con debates; etc.

The Avalon Project: [see above] http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/avalon.htm)www.law.emory.edu/FEDERAL --- complete Federalist Papers and search tools, also other documents of the founding period.

www.gwu.edu/~ffcp/---This is a new site, still being constructed, that includes all of the materials related to the First Federal Congress, which was important for establishing the Hamiltonian and Jeffersonian institutions that continued the discussion of Revolutionary accomplishments.

www.earlyamerica.com --- includes "The Early America Review" with many articles, plus

      • Alien and Sedition Acts
      • Whiskey Rebellion
      • Treaty of Greenville
      • Louisiana Purchase
      • Jay's Treaty
      • Northwest Ordinances
      • Washington's Farewell Address
      • Adventures of Daniel Boone (3 parts)
      • Vignettes on notable early American women
      • ETC.
For the Delaware Valley:
  1. You can do general web searches under "Philadelphia -- Revolution," or "Delaware -- Revolution," and come up with numerous possibilities to sift through. This is somewhat tedious, but yields good fruit, and is a valuable activity for students to do themselves. You will have to instruct them about how to tell good sites from poor ones.
  2. You can search under the names of events that took place in the region, to narrow down the search and target particular people and places. For example, "Head of Elk," "March to Brandywine," "Battle of Brandywine," "Paoli Massacre," "Cooch's Bridge," and especially "Valley Forge." There are others, of course.
  3. You can narrow the searching even further by looking for specific people and moments of the Revolution. E.g., "Stephen Girard”: there is an elaborate site with his biography, extensive activities in Philadelphia, and legacy. Or try a year such as 1763 or 1765.

Cathy Matson
History Department
University of Delaware
Cmatson@udel.edu