Editing 1774 (section)

=== July–September ===
* [[July 21]] – [[Russian Empire|Russia]] and the [[Ottoman Empire]] sign the [[Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca]] with Russian victory, ending [[Russo-Turkish War (1768–1774)|six years of war]]. The treaty gives Russia the right to intervene in Ottoman politics, to protect its Christian subjects.
* [[August 1]] – The element [[oxygen]] is discovered for the third time (the second quantitatively, following the somewhat earlier work of [[Carl Wilhelm Scheele]] (1771–72) by [[Joseph Priestley]], who publishes the fact in [[1775]], and so names the element (and usually gets all the credit, because his work was published first).
* [[August 6]] – [[Ann Lee]] and the Shakers arrive in America and settle in New York.<ref name="Carruth1774"/>
* [[September 1]] – [[Powder Alarm]]: [[Thomas Gage]], royal governor of the [[Province of Massachusetts Bay]], orders British soldiers to remove gunpowder from a [[Magazine (artillery)|magazine]], causing [[Patriot (American Revolution)|Patriot]]s to prepare for war.
* [[September 4]] – English explorer [[James Cook]] becomes the first European to sight (and name) the island of [[New Caledonia]] in [[Melanesia]]. 
* [[September 5]] – The [[First Continental Congress]] assembles in [[Philadelphia]].<ref name="Carruth1774"/>
* [[September 15]] – [[Yemelyan Pugachev]], leader of [[Pugachev's Rebellion]] against Russia by the [[Yaik Cossacks]], is betrayed by his own men after returning to Yaitsk (now [[Oral, Kazakhstan]]).<ref>Robert K. Massie, ''Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman'' (Random House, 2011) p406</ref> 
* [[September 21]] – [[George Mason]] and [[George Washington]] found the [[Fairfax County, Virginia|Fairfax County]] [[Militia]] Association, a military unit independent of British control.
* [[September 29]] – [[Johann Wolfgang von Goethe]]'s semi-autobiographical [[epistolary novel]] ''[[The Sorrows of Young Werther]]'' (''Die Leiden des jungen Werthers'') (written January–March) is published anonymously in Leipzig, Germany; it is influential in the ''[[Sturm und Drang]]'' movement and [[Romanticism]].