You're listening to an Airwave Media podcast.

Hello, and thanks for joining Revolution 250, where we look at events that took place 250 years ago this week.

This is from the American Revolution podcast, just a short bonus episode to remind you about important anniversaries from the Revolutionary War.

This week, we remember the effort to get Canada to join the fight for liberty.

When Johann Rawl received the letter on Christmas Day 1776, he put it away to read later.

Maybe he thought it was a season's greeting and wanted to save it for the fireside. But what it actually was was a warning, delivered to the Hessian colonel, letting him know

that General George Washington was crossing the Delaware and would soon attack his forces.

The next day, when Rawl lost the Battle of Trenton and died from two colonial boxing day musket balls,

the letter was found, unopened in his vest pockets. As someone with 15,000 unread emails in his

inbox, I feel like there's a lesson there. Oh well, this is the constant, a history of getting

things wrong. I'm Mark Chrysler. Every episode, we look at the bad ideas, mistakes,

and accidents that misshaped our world. Find us at constantpodcast.com or wherever you get your

podcasts.

When the Second Continental Congress met in May 1775, 1375, 13 colonies sent delegates.

Now, this was an improvement over the First Continental Congress, which only got representatives

from 12 colonies. Georgia never attended. This time, Georgia did, but Congress also wanted a 14th colony, that of Quebec.

The First Continental Congress had sent a letter the previous year. That appeal noted,

not only were the people of Quebec denied their fundamental rights, but that the Parliament

was now trying to retract those rights from the other colonies. The right to representative government,

no taxation without representation, trial by jury, habeas corpus, freedom of the press,

and land ownership without feudal obligations were all fundamental rights that the people of Quebec

deserved and were being denied. It called on Quebec to form its own provincial Congress

...