Peace of Paris (1783)

Peace of Paris
Map of North America after the Peace of Paris of 1783 (Vermont was independent until 1788)
Type
Signed3 September 1783 (1783-09-03)
LocationParis, France
Effective25 November 1783
ConditionRatification by Great Britain with France – the United Provinces will only be signed in 1784
Signatories
Parties
Ratifiers
  •  France
  •  Great Britain
  •  Spain
  •  United Provinces
  •  United States
Languages

The Peace of Paris of 1783 was the set of treaties that ended the American Revolutionary War. On 3 September 1783, representatives of King George III of Great Britain signed a treaty in Paris with representatives of the United States of America—commonly known as the Treaty of Paris (1783)—and two treaties at Versailles with representatives of King Louis XVI of France and King Charles III of Spain—commonly known as the Treaties of Versailles (1783). The previous day, a preliminary treaty had been signed with representatives of the States General of the Dutch Republic, but the final treaty which ended the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War was not signed until 20 May 1784; for convenience, however, it is included in the summaries below.

The treaty dictated that the British would lose their Thirteen Colonies and marked the end of the First British Empire. The United States gained more than it expected, thanks to the award of western territory.[1] France got its revenge over Britain after its defeat in the Seven Years' War and gained Tobago and Senegal but ended up financially exhausted. It was already in financial trouble and its borrowing to pay for the war used up all its credit and created the financial disasters that marked the 1780s, and some historians link those disasters to the coming of the French Revolution.[2] The Spanish regained Menorca, West Florida and East Florida from Britain.[3] The Dutch did not gain anything of significant value at the end of the war.

  1. ^ Richard Morris, The Peacemakers: The Great Powers and American Independence (1983)
  2. ^ Jack P. Greene; J. R. Pole (2008). A Companion to the American Revolution. John Wiley & Sons. p. 527. ISBN 9780470756447.
  3. ^ Lawrence S. Kaplan, "The Treaty of Paris, 1783: A Historiographical Challenge," International History Review, Sept 1983, Vol. 5 Issue 3, pp 431–442

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