Tuesday, October 04, 2011

Rutherford B. Hayes' Birthday


Rutherford Birchard Hayes, 19th President of the United States, was born on this day in 1822 in Delaware, Ohio, the youngest of five children of Rutherford Hayes and Sophia Birchard Hayes.


Recently Dead Presidents Daily asked Tom Culbertson, executive director of the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center in Fremont, Ohio, what people who only know about the Stolen Election of 1876 should know about President Hayes.


"President Hayes was the only president wounded during the Civil War," says Culbertson. "He received five wounds (one serious) and had four horses shot out from under him. He rose from major to brevet major general during the war.


"He was 38 years old when the war started and could have avoided serving due to his age, but chose to fight because he and his wife Lucy thought that ending slavery was a good cause. As a lawyer in Cincinnati prior to the Civil War, he occasionally did pro bono work representing runaway slaves."


Culbertson added that the Hayes Center is within six months of wrapping up a major restoration of the interior of the Hayes home "so that it looks like it did when Rutherford and Lucy lived there. Come back if you get a chance."

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