Zachary Taylor: War heroes and conspiracy theory

Presidential

The Washington Post

History, Government, Education

4.5 • 3.7K Ratings

🗓️ 27 March 2016

⏱️ 29 minutes

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Summary

Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank joins historians Catherine Clinton and Joseph Uscinski to talk about military hero Zachary Taylor and the assassination theories that swirled around his death in the White House.

Transcript

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0:00.0	On a warm June day in 1991, with cameras rolling and a crowd watching, President
0:10.5	Sakary Taylor's body was removed from its limestone mausoleum in Louisville, Kentucky.
0:16.7	They were about to test nearly 150 years after his death, whether the
0:22.6	conspiracy theories were right and he had actually been poisoned. If so, he would
0:28.7	be the first President assassinated in American history. I'm Lilian
0:35.5	cutting him with the Washington Post and this is the 12th episode of Presidential.
0:58.7	Sakary Taylor was born in Virginia like so many other presidents we've had up
1:11.8	until this point. He was born there in November of 1784, which means he was four
1:18.8	years old when George Washington became president and he was 12 years old when
1:24.1	George Washington left the presidency. Just imagine what your view of America
1:28.9	would be like if this is the time you grow up in. Though he was born in Virginia, his
1:33.6	family was one of the many families that moved westward as the country was
1:37.2	expanding. So most of his childhood was spent on the Kentucky frontier. He was
1:43.5	one of eight children and at first his family lived in this really small cabin
1:48.8	in the woods. They were planters though and eventually his father did quite
1:53.3	well, well enough that he acquired more and more land, built the cabin into a
1:57.6	real house and ended up having close to 30 slaves. Sakary Taylor had a decent
2:04.1	education but he was never a great student. He was always interested in
2:08.8	military service though. So when he was about 23 years old, he became an officer
2:14.6	in the army and the way that he got this army commission is that small world. His
2:20.5	cousin was James Madison who at the time was serving as secretary of state.
2:28.7	So to help me explore Sakary Taylor's personality, leadership style and
	...

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