The Birmingham age-herald., 1914-06-12
ZACHARY TAYLOR AND
 BRADDOCK'S SCARF

BRADDOCK'S SCARF 1
 Much has been said about the bril- |
 liant career of Gen Zachary Taylor in |
 the former broil with Mexico, but his election to the presidency and his tenure | in the White House have hardly been |
 more than mentioned, says writer in
 the Pittsburg Dispatch. Directly after that war was ended General Taylor was | elected on the whig ticket after a sen sational campaign. Aside from his ex- ploits in Mexico, General Taylor had | fought famous battles with the Indians, |
 and this made him an invincible can didate, though General Scott made every |
 attempt to grasp the prize. "Old Rough |
 and Ready" as General Taylor was |
 called, received 16S electoral votes;
 General Cass. democrat, 127, and Martin | Van Buren, free soil, none. Scott was |
 out of the running Taylor was elected |
 in 1s4s. On July g, 1850, he died of an |
 attack of bilious collie, 16 months after
 his inauguration. Only one President had a briefer tenure William Henry Har-
 rison, who died of a mysterious attack
 exactly one month after his inaugural
 tion. The attack was blamed on the vile | Washington water, but many believed |
 at the time that Harrison was poisoned | , by some of his opponents In that tre- mendous Log Cabin" Hard Cider"
 campaign. one of the bitterest ever
 waged.
 l charming feature of the brief tenure
 of Taylor was that his daughter, Betty, married to his private secretary just before the inauguration. that gentleman having been an officer in the Mexican
 war under General Taylor, was for that
 16 months the mistress of the White
 House, Mrs. Taylor being an invalid. 1 Betty had one brother, Dick" Taylor,
 who entered the civil war as a brigadier
 general on the Confederate side, was
 hade lieutenant general, led his troops in some of the fiercest battles. | His home was burned by northern sol
 diers, his great Louisiana plantation
 destroyed, yet he was such favorite
 with northern officers after the war
 that he had many fayors from them for the south, even from General Grant, who at the request of General Dick"
 replaced the too implacable General
 Sehridan with General Hancock, in com
 mand of New Orleans.
 Betty Taylor, as she was always
 known, had means and lived with her
 mother. until the death of the latter, 1 In Washington and Virginia. Like Gen. eral Dick" who had been educated at Yale and at two or three of the great | European universities, Betty's educa-
 tion gave her the highest accomplis- ments and she was fascinating widow l Later she married into the Dandridge 1 | family, one of the most aristocratic in Virginia.
 | Her father was son of old Virginia, though his people went to Kentucky when he was almost child. His father was a colonel in the war of the Revo- lution and although Zachary worked on the Kentucky plantation until he was a young man. and had little more than an elementary education, he had the military blood, read with the greatest diligence and went Into the army at an early age.
 l curious and absolutely authentic story in connection with the Taylor | family, and in later years in connec- tion with Betty Taylor, was that one l of the many previous relics in the pos- session of General and President Tay- 1 Tor was the great silken scarf in which General Braddock was carried from Braddocks Field after his fatal fight. It was the practice in those days, when army ambulances were un- known, for officers to wear these strong and beautiful scarfs; and if one of them was killed or fatally wounded the scarf. stronger and more convenient than any other description of stretcher, would be swung between two horses. the body placed upon 1t and taken from the field or to a place Of fnterment.
 Thus was the body of the general carried away by his friends, Col. George Washington having a part in the ceremony. The scarf, stained with the blood of the British general, came into the keeping of a gentleman of New Orleans years before the Mexican war. but with the stipulation after that war was begun that it should be pre- sented to the greatest and most popu- lar general. Thus it came into the pos session of General Taylor It was the impression of Betty that 1t had been given to her brother Dick" but in looking through the private effects of the family when death took 1t from the White House. the famous scarf was found. 1t being well known to the former mistress of the executive man. sion, as 1t had often been shown to her by her father and the story of 1t told
 The writer visited Mrs. Dandridge at Winchester, a few years before her death, was shown the famous re1ic and the story of 1t was then told fully In the Dispatch. The history of the scarf was well known. It was in no way complex, but was authenticated step by step. and 1t was to be regret ed that a relic so interesting to Pitts burgers and to the whole country could not have been secured for the Carnegie museum. Where 1t is now the writer has not the yaRueat idaa