Margaret Mackall Smith Taylor, Mary Elizabeth Taylor Bliss (daughter); 1849-1850

Margaret, Born: 1788, Died: 1852
Mary, Born: 1825, Died: 1909

Margaret Mackall Smith, known as "Peggy," grew up amid the comforts of a Maryland plantation and attended finishing school in New York. At 21, while visiting her sister in Kentucky, Peggy met 28-year-old Lt. Zachary Taylor. They wed in 1810 and soon adopted the Army's itinerant lifestyle. They traveled from fort to fort -- in Florida, Arkansas, Minnesota, Louisiana, and Mississippi -- always bringing their good furniture and fine china along. But life on the frontier was hard. In 1820, a fever claimed two of their six children and left Peggy's health impaired. (A third daughter died later, soon after she wed Lt. Jefferson Davis.)

During Zachary's valorous service in the Mexican War of 1846-48, Peggy lived in Baton Rouge on a cotton plantation the couple had bought for retirement. It was there Zachary returned after the War and there he learned of his nomination for and election to the Presidency -- a job neither he nor Peggy wanted. At the white House, Peggy received family and friends privately upstairs. But she assigned all public hostessing duties to her 23-year-old daughter, Betty, the recent bride of Lt. Col. William Bliss. when Zachary died 16 months into office, Peggy was too distraught to attend his funeral. She died two years later. No likeness of her survives.

Twelfth President
Zachary Taylor