William Richard Taylor
Taliaferro
by Margaret Strebel Hartman-Campbell County Historian
William Richard Taylor Taliaferro, Richard as he is so often referred to in the records of Campbell County, was born November 8, 1802 in Caroline County, Virginia,
the son of Richard Taliaferro and
Anna Taylor
and died in Highland Heights January 17, 1893. He moved to Kentucky with
his mother and siblings
in 1814 and settled near Newport. For a time their home was a popular
preaching place for the circuit preacher till the Old Buckeye School house was
built.
On April 21, 1824 he married Alice Berry, the daughter of
Washington and
Alice Taylor Berry. A home was built in 1830 for them in Ft. Thomas which
still stands today. She died March 18, 1838. On April 16, 1840, Richard
married Harriet McGrew, daughter of Thomas McGrew. Harriett died in 1847. Richard then married Cassander
Stiff, a widow, in July of 1850.
Children of William Richard Taylor Taliaferro and Harriet McGrew
1. William Richard Jr.
2. Lydia B-married a Southgate
3. Thomas F
Taliaferro-became a Methodist minister
He was a charter member of the Mt. Pleasant Church which was organized in his home in the 1830s.
Nathaniel Southgate Shaler referred to Richard in his autobiography.
"From the many sturdy old men who were about me
in my youth,
I had many stories of the pioneer stages of the settlement of
Northern Kentucky and the neighboring parts of Ohio. I
remember best a certain Richard Taliaferro, a remote kinsman,
a very gentle giant, who as a lad of fifteen had captained a party
of women, children and some slaves from eastern Virginia to their
destination on the Kentucky shore just above Cincinnati. They traveled
by horse and wagon to the Monongahela River and then built a broad horn on which they floated down the Ohio, seeking for the
sign of their landing place, a white flag on a tree-top. They found it
and established nearby the home of his long life. When I last saw
him about 1888, he showed me over the place. Of his house, which
he dearly loved, he said, 'Here were raised eighteen children and
there never was a quarrel among them.' He was himself the
embodiment of peace."