 |
Zachary Taylorb. 24 Nov 1784, Montebello (near Barboursville), Orange County, Virginia |
| Title: | President of the United States of America |
| Term: | 4 Mar 1849 - 9 Jul 1850 |
| Chronology: | 7 Nov 1848, electors appointed/popular voting |
| 6 Dec 1848, elected by vote of the electors | |
| 5 Mar 1849, sworn in, East Portico, U.S. Capitol, Washington, D.C. [1] | |
| 9 Jul 1850, died |
| Biography: | ||||||||||||||||
Moved with parents to Kentucky from Virginia; received only a rudimentary education; enlisted in the army (1806); commissioned first lieutenant in the infantry (1808); promoted to captain (1810); commanded Fort Knox, Vincennes, Indian Territory (1811); promoted to major (1812); resigned commission (1815); re-commissioned (1816); promoted to lieutenant colonel (1819); commanded Fort Snelling, Northwest Territory (1828-1829); promoted to colonel and assigned command of Fort Crawford, Michigan Territory (1829); served Black Hawk War (1832); won victory against Seminole Indians near Lake Okeechobee, Florida, in Second Seminole War 1837; promoted to brigadier general (1838); commander of all Florida forces (1838-1840); commander, 2nd Department Western Division of US Army (1841); commander, 1st Department Western Division US Army (1844); won victory over Mexicans at Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma (8-9 May 1846); promoted to major general (1846); won victory at in the Battle of Buena Vista (22-23 Feb 1847); commander of US Forces in Northern Mexico (1847); nominated presidential candidate at the Whig convention in June 1848; elected President of the United States in 1848; advocated statehood for California and New Mexico, but faced bitter opposition of Southerners in Congress, who feared a permanent majority of free states in the US Senate; financial improprieties on the part of three Cabinet members revealed in 1850; died suddenly of an attack of cholera. [2] |
||||||||||||||||
| Election results: | ||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
| Sources and notes: | ||||||||||||||||
| [1] | Inauguration was postponed as 4 Mar 1849 fell on a Sunday. According to the order of succession stipulated by the Presidential Succession Act of 1792 (in effect until 1886), the President pro tempore of the Senate David Rice Atchison should have filled in the vacancy, but in fact he never served as president on that day. Ambiguity of the situation raised an issue of the "one-day president" as some believed that Atchison served in that capacity for one day. However, there is nothing to support this theory as Atchison was never actually sworn in as president and in his own words spent that Sunday mostly at home. For more details see here. | |||||||||||||||
| [2] | "Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage", 107th ed. (London: Burke's Peerage, Ltd., 2003). | |||||||||||||||
| Image: portrait of Zachary Taylor (photographed 1849; reproduction of a daguerreotype by Mathew Brady), Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C. | ||||||||||||||||
Main Projects
RSS feed 