When people remade their nations
In Hand of History for July 2, 2026 you place these 10 real events back into the order they happened. Here they are in chronological order, with the date revealed and why each one matters.
The document argues that a king who fails his people is like a shepherd who abandons his flock — and can be dismissed like a bad employee.
The Act of Abjuration is the declaration of independence by many of the provinces of the Netherlands from their allegiance to Philip II of Spain, during the Dutch Revolt.
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William's invasion fleet is so large it takes several days to pass a single coastal point, yet James's navy never fires a shot.
The Glorious Revolution was the deposition of King James II in November 1688. He was replaced by his daughter Mary II and her Dutch husband, James's nephew William III of Orange. The two ruled as joint monarchs of England, Scotland, and Ireland until Mary's death in 1694, when William became ruler in his own right. Jacobitism, the political movement that aimed to restore the exiled James or his descendants of the House of Stuart to the throne, persisted into the late 18th century. Some historians consider it the last successful invasion of England.
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The British column sent to seize colonial weapons ends up losing nearly three times as many men as the farmers who opposed it.
The Battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, were the first major military actions between the British Army and Patriot militias from British America's Thirteen Colonies during the American Revolutionary War. The opposing forces fought day-long running battles in Middlesex County in the Province of Massachusetts Bay, in the towns of Lexington, Concord, Lincoln, Menotomy, and Cambridge.
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The winning margin in New Hampshire is just ten votes — and several delegates only switched sides after being threatened with political consequences back home.
The United States Constitution has served as the supreme law of the United States since taking effect in 1789. The document was written at the 1787 Philadelphia Convention and was ratified through a series of state conventions held in 1787 and 1788. Since 1789, the Constitution has been amended twenty-seven times; particularly important amendments include the ten amendments of the United States Bill of Rights, the three Reconstruction Amendments, and the Nineteenth Amendment.
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The rebellion's leader, Wolfe Tone, is a Protestant lawyer who models the revolt on the French Revolution — and actually persuades France to send 14,000 troops, who are scattered by storms before they can land.
The Irish Rebellion of 1798 was a popular insurrection against the British Crown in what was then the separate, but subordinate, Kingdom of Ireland. The main organising force was the Society of United Irishmen. First formed in Belfast by Presbyterians opposed to the landed Anglican establishment, the Society, despairing of reform, sought to secure a republic through a revolutionary union with the country's Catholic majority. The grievances of a rack-rented tenantry drove recruitment.
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They choose the indigenous Taíno name for the island — a pointed rejection of every trace of French colonial identity.
The Haitian Revolution, also known as the Haitian War of Independence, was a successful insurrection by enslaved Africans against French colonial rule in Saint-Domingue, now the sovereign state of Haiti. The revolution was one of the only known slave rebellions in human history that led to the founding of a state which was both free from slavery and ruled by former captives.
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Hidalgo had no prepared speech — accounts agree his words were improvised, which is why no one can agree on exactly what he said.
The Cry of Dolores occurred in Dolores, Mexico, on 16 September 1810, when Roman Catholic priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla rang his church bell and gave the call to arms that triggered the Mexican War of Independence. The Cry of Dolores is most commonly known by the locals as El Grito de Independencia.
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He never actually shouts the words now carved on Mexico's National Palace — the famous 'Grito' speech was reconstructed decades later by a different president.
The Cry of Dolores occurred in Dolores, Mexico, on 16 September 1810, when Roman Catholic priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla rang his church bell and gave the call to arms that triggered the Mexican War of Independence. The Cry of Dolores is most commonly known by the locals as El Grito de Independencia.
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The cause attracts so many idealistic foreign volunteers — including the poet Lord Byron — that they earn their own nickname: Philhellenes.
The Greek War of Independence, also known as the Greek Revolution or the Greek Revolution of 1821, was a successful war of independence fought by Greek revolutionaries against the Ottoman Empire from 1821 to 1829. In 1826, the Greeks were assisted by the British Empire, the Kingdom of France, and the Russian Empire, while the Ottomans were aided by their vassals, especially by the Eyalet of Egypt. The war led to the formation of modern Greece, which in subsequent years would be expanded to its current size. The revolution is commemorated by Greeks in Greece and the Greek diaspora on 25 March, as Independence Day.
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The revolutions spread so fast that rulers in some capitals abdicate before any rebel even reaches their palace gates.
The revolutions of 1848, also known as the springtime of the peoples, were a series of revolutions throughout Europe that spanned almost two years, between January 1848 and October 1849. They remain the most widespread revolutionary wave in European history to date.
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