Zachary Taylor, 12th US President: Transcribed Will Which Includes Special Considerations for His Servants. Zachary Taylor (1784-1850), President (March 1849-July 1850) and Major General in the US Army, known as "Old Rough and Ready": Last Will and Testament Composed Prior to his Military Campaign in the Seminole War in Florida.
"Being about to enter on a campaign in Florida should it be my lot to fall by the enemy, or be victim to the climate I direct the following disposition to be made of my property…" The dangers of the Seminole War were well known, diseases like malaria and yellow fever killing three times more soldiers than combat never mind the swampy terrain and months long heat.
Manuscript document in an unknown hand, comprising Taylor's Last Will and Testament of 20 November 1837, likely the copy owned by Dr. Robert C. Wood (one of Taylor's attending physicians and later his son-in-law), with the first nine words possibly in Wood's hand.
"Being about to enter on a campaign in Florida".
Of note in the opening statement of his will Taylor writes
"First I leave to my dear wife Margaret Taylor for ever to do with as she may think proper, my servants Charles, Tom, Dicy, Jane and her children al my bank stock in the bank of Louisville, Louisville Bank and in the Northern Bank of Kentucky," which reflects a special esteemed status of these "servants" and left Margaret discretion regarding their emancipation. Referring to them as "servants" and not as slaves was a rare genteel language for the South, where Southern newspaper discourse during the 1850s overwhelmingly does not refer to slaves as servants.
Taylor at one point owned about 150 slaves. His inclusion in the will for some of these "servants" to stay with the family is noteworthy, reflecting a special status as domestic servants or even potentially with whom he may have fathered children. In particular Jane Webb according to oral history may have been the mother of a child William by Taylor in 1835, for which DNA confirmation does not exist, with the death of Taylor's son Richard having ended Taylor's known male lineage. Taylor benefited from the educated and trained background of his "servants" having their assistance when he brought some of them on military encampments, ultimately bringing some of them to the White House in 1849. Charles Porter was among those he brought to the White House, whose death was observed in an obituary in the Alexandria Gazette on August 1,1849--unusual for a slave.
Taylor's wife receives the general's bank stock, his household and kitchen furniture, and a small parcel of land from which she will receive the income when sold. To his daughter Ann, he leaves $30,000 and a parcel of land in Kentucky. To his daughter Mary Elizabeth, he leaves his property in the city of Louisville. As was customary, however, the major share of Taylor's estate, his plantation in Louisiana including all of its slaves, was left to his only son, future Confederate General Richard Taylor, who was only eleven years old in 1837:
"during his minority I direct the plantation aforesaid and servants to be placed under the management of some humane and careful individual.Again, Taylor's language reflects his manner of slaveholding, and reflects the contradictions in his life whereby as President he sought to block the extension of slavery to new states, and to limit Southern action toward fugitive slaves by a planned veto of Henry Clay and Daniel Webster's Compromise of 1850. The Compromise of 1850 was signed by Taylor's successor in office--Millard Fillmore--potentially setting the stage for the nation's descent toward Civil War in the assessment of some historians.
The Fashion Plantation of Louisiana given to his son Richard was burned to the ground in September 1862 by Union forces after a skirmish, after having already been occupied and plundered. This lost much of Taylor's papers and artifacts to posterity, making it harder for historians to assess much of his legacy as well as his possible fathering of children with slaves such as Jane.
Most interesting is his stipulation in his will, twice on page 2, of a Servant girl Matilda, who he leaves to his daughter Mary Elizabeth. Is it possible that Matilda is his daughter? The text of his will may suggest avenues for future genealogic investigation.
Taylor was the second U.S. President to die in office, on July 9, 1850. Because his symptoms could be compatible with arsenic poisoning, and because he had powerful political enemies who celebrated his death, an exhumation was allowed in 1991 which yielded results inconclusive but not supportive of poisoning through arsenic. A request for exhumation in 1997 for more extensive forensic analysis was denied by the National Park Service. Taylor is the only US President who has been exhumed for forensic analysis. This is understandable given the impact of his death on the subsequent course of American history.
[Washington], 16 July 1850. 3 1/2; pages, 4to, some minor water staining, otherwise fine. Full transcript available on request and is included with manuscript.
Estimated Value $5,000 - 8,000
U.S. Presidents
