The First Continental Congress met at Carpenters’ Hall in Philadelphia in 1774.
Delegates from 12 of the 13 British colonies gathered there from September 5 to October 26, 1774. Georgia did not send delegates because Loyalist sentiment remained strong in the colony. The meeting was prompted by Britain’s punitive Intolerable Acts, imposed after the Boston Tea Party.
The congress did not declare independence. Instead, it adopted the Continental Association, a coordinated boycott of British goods, and sent a petition to King George III. The delegates also agreed to meet again if Britain failed to address their grievances.
Carpenters’ Hall was the meeting place of the Carpenters’ Company of the City and County of Philadelphia. The Second Continental Congress met in the Pennsylvania State House, now called Independence Hall, beginning in 1775. That later congress adopted the Declaration of Independence in 1776, the event at the center of America250.