Cassie Chadwick: a very double life by Lindsay Kernohan
In the spring of 1902 James Dillon re - ceived a delightful surprise when he ran into Mrs. Cassie Chadwick, the wife of a dear friend, in the lobby of a New York hotel. She explained that she was on her way to her father’s house. Would he escort her there? The pair took a carriage to the man- sion belonging to Andrew Carnegie on East 91st Street. Chadwick, leav - ing Dillon behind in the carriage, re- quested to speak to the head house- keeper, explaining that she was there to check the references of a potential new maid. The housekeeper insisted
who was sent back to Canada to be raised by her parents. She then moved to Ohio as Mme. Linda Devere, where she tricked Joseph Lamb into cashing forged cheques for her. She raised $40,000 with this scheme before being arrested. Sentenced to 9.5 years, she served only 3.5. Elizabeth returned to Cleveland as Cassie Hoover and married Dr. Leroy Chadwick, a wealthy widower. The marriage shocked his friends and family; no one had met her, and rumours swirled that the pair had met while she was working in a brothel. Thanks to the Chadwick family, Cassie was now wealthy enough to enjoy a lavish lifestyle and lived quietly with her husband for years. By 1902, however, she was back to her old ways. Using her faked promissory notes from Carnegie, Chadwick defrauded several large banks, taking out loans and paying them off with money from other loans. As she defaulted on her debts, family members and old acquaintances stepped forward to confirm she was not related to Carnegie. Chadwick was arrested in November 1904. In March 1905, she was found guilty of conspiracy and sentenced to ten years in prison, where she died in October 1907. Before her death, she arranged for a portion of her hidden funds to be sent to Canada to purchase a tombstone. She is buried in Woodstock’s Angli - can Cemetery. While the total amount of Cassie Chadwick’s spoils is unknown, it is estimated at around $16.5 million in today’s dollars. She caused the bankruptcy of the Citizen’s National Bank of Oberlin and ruined the personal fortunes of many. Con artist, fraudster, charlatan. Was Cassie Chadwick indeed one of Strathroy’s own? Numerous sources state that Bigley was born in Strathroy, al - though there is little documentation to back this claim. While the truth about her early years may be lost, her exploits as an adult have cemented her into the historical record as one of North America’s greatest imposters. Euclid Ave. mansion of Cassie Chadwick on Cleveland's Millionaire's Row Photo credit: Wikipedia, Public Domain
Cassie L. Chadwick 1904.
that there must be a misunderstanding – no one by that name had ever worked there. Cassie thanked her and, as she walked back to the carriage, pulled a large envelope out of her coat. Dil- lon, embarrassed, awkwardly asked who her father was. Cassie explained that she was Andrew Carnegie’s illegitimate daugh - ter. He provided for her and she would inherit millions when he died. Cassie showed him the contents of her envelope, filled with promissory notes signed by Carnegie himself. It was a fantastic, brazen story – with only one problem. Not only was she not Carnegie’s daughter, she had never met the man. Cassie Chadwick was just one of many names used by imposter Elizabeth Bigley. Elizabeth Bigley was born in the late 1850s and grew up on a small Ontario farm. There is little information available about her early years, and much of it is contradictory, due in part to Eliza- beth herself continually lying and changing stories to evade the clutches of the law. Many accounts list her birthdate as October 10, 1857, although her gravestone states 1859. Alternate sourc - es list her place of birth as Strathroy, Eastwood in Oxford County, or Woodstock. The 1861 census identifies an Elizabeth Bigley, age 3, living in East Oxford. Elizabeth perpetrated her first fraud as a teenager when she opened a bank account in Woodstock using a dubious letter of inheritance from an uncle, then wrote worthless cheques on the account to various merchants. She was caught but released due to her youth. But her escapades continued and more of her fraudulent schemes were exposed locally and then in Cleveland. From there, Elizabeth went on a journey of re-invention, living in boarding houses and adopting new aliases. There were multiple short marriages, including one to a man named Hoover, who left her an inheritance of $50,000. The pair had a son named Emil,
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