Franklin Pierce (1804-1869) was an American politician and the fourteenth President of the United States, serving from 1853 to 1857. He is to date the only president from New Hampshire and was the first president born in the nineteenth century. Pierce was a Democrat and a "doughface" (a Northerner with Southern sympathies) who served in the U. S. House of Representatives and Senate. Later, Pierce took part in the Mexican-American War and became a brigadier general. His private law practice in his home state, New Hampshire, was so successful that he was offered several important positions, which he turned down. Later, he was nominated for president as a dark horse candidate on the 49th ballot at the 1852 Democratic National Convention.