02/01/2025

What did I already know?

I saw a photo of him in a uniform once, so he was probably a big war guy. Ate cherries and milk, and died. That’s it!

What did I plan to see?

Zachary Taylor National Cemetery, Louisville, Kentucky — on The List. As far as I can tell, Taylor’s the only president with no library or house or gift shop. (The nerve, right?) Just the cemetery he’s buried in.

The Trip There

Taylor was the first of three sites I planned to visit in two days. (Stay tuned!) I decided to drag my mother along - she enjoys these weird little road trips, and was probably relieved to not have to plan one.

Zachary Taylor: The Shimmy

Born in 1784 and raised in the Kentucky wilderness, he joined the U.S. army in 1806. He had a successful early career in the War of 1812, and alternated fighting southern Indigenous tribes with raising a family. (Meanwhile, I put off doing the dishes for days on end.) He returned to a successful later career in the Mexican-American War - he was there at the start, and at its culmination at the Battle of Buena Vista, where he disobeyed the president and won a battle against a Mexican force four times as big as his.

He was elected president as a Whig in 1848, and evidently wasn’t wild about it, choosing to delegate responsibility to department officials. He did oppose slavery, tried to stop it in newly-acquired territories (Manifest Destiny, baby!), and supported making California, where slavery was illegal, a state. Also, a decade before, he’d opposed his daughter marrying future U.S. villain Jefferson Davis?? (She did it anyway, and incidentally died pretty soon after.)

Less than 18 months into his term, he caught what most people say is either cholera or food poisoning, and died. Possibly from the cherries and milk. But there’s a conspiracy claiming that he was poisoned by pro-slavery politicians, which is fascinating and a rabbit hole for another time.

Oh! They coined the term “Old Rough and Ready” about him, if you’re looking for a nickname.

Notes from the Trip

We pulled into the cemetery around 11:00 a.m. on a cold Saturday. It being a military cemetery, we drove down a loooong driveway of neat white gravestones, to a circle drive at the end. We were stared down by a fifty-foot-tall monument of Taylor with a statue of the freaking man himself at the top. To our right, a limestone mausoleum housed his and his wife’s bodies.

We stayed twenty minutes and took photos. I tried to find the graves of his six kids. But it was cold, and we had another president to get to.

Themes of Taylor’s Life

Anti-climactic. A forty-year military career rocked with success? A Southerner running a pre-Civil War presidency against slavery? With all due respect to the man, doesn’t it seem like it should have all added to something more?

Maybe it did and I’m just not seeing it. Who knows? I’m not even thirty. Speaking of which…

Where was he at my age?

Man was 28 in 1812. He was married with a kid. They’d just finished renovating a house in Baton Rouge, and he was on the frontlines of the starting-up War of 1812 in Indiana.

Favorite Food?

He liked beignets. That’s all I got. I can’t apologize enough for having let you down here.

Where else to go:

We were Louisville for a full hour. We only went to the cemetery. I feel unqualified to say anything else.