How Cassie Chadwick Pulled Off One of the Greatest Bank Heists in History

Female con artist Cassie Chadwick leveraged Gilded Age prejudices to scam her way into millions of dollars in what historians now call the “Carnegie Con”

In 1905, Cassie Chadwick was convicted of conspiracy against the U.S. government and conspiracy to defraud a national bank. She had conned banks, businessmen, and investors out of millions dollars – at least $35 million today – by claiming to be an heiress to Andrew Carnegie’s fortune. Living a lavish lifestyle on borrowed money and going undetected as a fraud for years, Chadwick earned herself the nickname, “The Queen of Ohio.” The conviction concluded her decades-long career as a solo female con artist who pulled off one of the greatest bank heists in history.

Chadwick’s Roots as Elizabeth Bigley

Cassie Chadwick was born in Ontario, Canada in 1857 as Elizabeth Bigley. Her first major attempt at a con was at age 13. By writing a letter to herself announcing the death of a relative who’d left her a small inheritance, she deceived a local bank into issuing her checks connected to the relative’s nonexistent accounts. She was caught shortly thereafter and let off with a warning, but Bigley would soon try again.

In her early twenties, Bigley once more attempted her inheritance hoax, now with more careful attention to detail. She wrote herself a letter, this time from a fictional Ontario attorney, notifying her of $15,000 left to her by a wealthy philanthropist; she then obtained business cards reading, “Miss Bigley, Heiress to $15,000,” which mimicked the calling cards of the Victorian social elite.

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