Millard Fillmore, (born January 7, 1800, Locke township, New York, U.S.—died March 8, 1874, Buffalo, New York), 13th president of the United States (1850–53), whose insistence on federal enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 alienated the North and led to the destruction of the Whig Party. Elected vice president in 1848, he became chief executive on the death of President Zachary Taylor (July 1850). Fillmore was born in a log cabin to a poor family and was apprenticed to a wool carder at age 15. He received little formal education until he was 18, when he managed to