"Zachary Taylor" on this segment of the President's Day episode of Kentucky Life on KET.

Despite the fact that Louisiana is considered his home state, Zachary Taylor, who was president from 1849-1850, has many ties to Kentucky. Born in Virginia in 1785, he was raised here on a farm two miles east of Louisville, on Muddy Fork of Beargrass Creek. He married in Kentucky and five of his six children were born here.

In later life, his home was in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where he was a slaveholder with a cotton plantation in Mississippi. A career military man, "Old Rough and Ready" became a national hero in the Mexican-American War—and a perfect choice for presidential candidate among Southerners.

After Taylor was elected president in 1848, he surprised everyone by rejecting the extension of slavery into those territories recently taken from Mexico. Kentucky's Henry Clay came up with a compromise, proposing that California be admitted as a free state and the other territories be allowed to have slavery. Taylor remained opposed, so much so that the old general threatened to lead the Army against Southern secessionists.

A compromise was still under debate when Taylor died unexpectedly on July 9, 1850, after a brief but severe gastrointestinal illness. Official word from his doctors was that he died of cholera. Taylor's body was taken back home to Louisville for burial in the family cemetery.

However, for over a century afterward, some historians wondered if Taylor's political enemies had poisoned him with arsenic. His body was exhumed in 1991 and the Kentucky coroner, Dr. George Nichols, said it was his opinion that Taylor died of natural causes, not arsenic poisoning.

Today, the Zachary Taylor National Cemetery in Louisville is the final resting place for thousands of soldiers.



Learn more about KET's program Kentucky Life at http://www.ket.org/kentuckylife/
Visit Kentucky Life's Facebook page:   / kentuckylife  

Subscribe to the KET channel: http://www.youtube.com/subscription_c...