If you are not a fan of History and the period of the early 20th century in New York, it took a while to understand “who Maud Beaton is”, the character who entered quietly, circulated among everyone, and left a trail of destruction that will reverse the entire story of The Gilded Age. And, like other characters in the HBO Max series, Maud Beaton is inspired by a true story. Who was the real fraudster who ruined several bankers in the late 1880s? Cassie Chadwick. That’s right, poor Oscar Van Rhijn represents a series of men that Cassie ruined by posing as the illegitimate heiress of a New York millionaire. And few, like him, were able to confront her.

Her story is so fascinating that it has already spawned books, series, and films. Some would say that it even inspired the recent scammer Anna Delvey or Anna Sorokin, the German woman who was arrested and is the subject of the Netflix series, Inventing Anna. The showrunners, however, cite the “original”, Cassie, as Maud’s mirror, which makes us feel sorry for Oscar (none of her victims recovered their money), but hope for justice: eventually, Cassie was arrested. Let’s find out what else could come up in The Gilded Age?

Scammer from birth

It’s always tense to find out what’s really true about scammers, but Cassie was born Elizabeth Bigley in October 1857 in Ontario, Canada. Betty’s story was not that unusual: a large family – she was the fifth of eight children – and extreme poverty marked her existence, but clearly from an early age, she was determined for greater things. While still young, she lost hearing in one ear and developed a speech problem, always using a few words and liking to “imitate” her siblings and parents’ handwriting. The training served as her first strike at 13 years old.

Betty wrote a letter saying that an uncle had died and left her a small amount of money, creating an authentic-looking document. A local bank believed him and issued checks to accounts later revealed to be non-existent. Betty used the money, but after a few months, she was arrested. As she was a minor, she was only told to “never do that again”. From then on, she accumulated lies.

Among her most common activities was pretending to be a psychic. She played two La Roses and then Madame Lydia De Vere, but also married and separated for money, ran a brothel, and finally posed as the illegitimate daughter of a millionaire. Unsurprisingly, con artists – especially women – came to be called ‘Cassies’. The scandal she provoked in New York was so big that she could not have been left out of The Gilded Age.

At just 22 years old, Betty created the move that would become her “trademark”. Using expensive letterhead, where she inserted the fictitious name and address of a London lawyer, notifying herself that “a philanthropist had died and left her an inheritance of 15 thousand dollars”, but that she needed to present herself to receive the amount. Her business cards were very similar to the calling cards of the time, writing that she

The plan was simple, using the business practices of the time to her advantage. For example, Betty would go into a store, choose an expensive item, and then write a check for more than the price. The difference was paid in cash. When the salesperson didn’t trust her, Betty showed her her business card, and 10 times out of 10 it worked. Why would she have an heiress card if it wasn’t true?

The attacks also targeted relatives. When she stayed with her sister Alice, now married, Betty evaluated everything she had in her home and got a bank loan, using the furniture as collateral. When Alice’s husband discovered the ruse, he kicked his sister-in-law out of their home, and she moved to another part of the city, where she met a certain Dr. Wallace S. Springsteen. Although Betty was not considered beautiful, the doctor was enchanted by her, and the two married. The wedding announcement led to several angry merchants knocking on the couple’s door to demand refunds, scaring Dr. Springsteen when he saw it was all true. He paid off his wife’s debts but separated immediately. The wedding lasted 12 days.

Afterward, Betty improved her skills, whether as a psychic or a fake heiress, and she even married two of her clients and had a child with one of them (the child was raised by her grandparents in Canada). A few years later, Betty was convicted of forgery and sentenced to nine and a half years (she served three) in the state penitentiary, and even behind bars, she continued to deceive the most vulnerable.

Upon leaving prison, Betty changed her name once again, going by Cassie L. Hoover until she married another doctor, Leroy S. Chadwick, a rich widower from a traditional family. During this period, there were rumors that she ran a brothel and that the lonely doctor was one of her clients. After living a naughty life, it was like Cassie Chadwick, who began to spread the lie that she was the illegitimate daughter of Andrew Carnegie, at the time one of the richest men in the world, who had sold his steel company for 14.8 billion dollars, she set it to break.

The fraud that made Cassie famous involved large sums of money from financial institutions, the largest in the country, with sums always exceeding $10,000. Betty/Cassie would take out several loans, paying the first with the money from the second, and so on, always with forged Carnegie promissory notes.

It was the investment banker, Herbert Newton, who ended the scammer’s streak of luck. He paid large sums, but when he realized that the “heiress” had no intention of paying what she owed, he took legal action against her, but behold, Cassie/Betty not only denied all the accusations but also the allegation of any relationship with Andrew Carnegie. She was arrested, and here we can draw a parallel with our Oscar Van Rihkn from The Gilded Age by remembering what Charles Beckwith, president of one of the defrauded and failed banks, said when he visited her in prison. “You’ve ruined me,” he said, “but I’m still not so sure you’re a fraud.” I can easily imagine this confrontation between Oscar and Maude.

To this day, the total amount that Cassie Chadwick defrauded is unknown because many of her victims refused to speak out of shame, but it is estimated at around 16.5 million in today’s dollars. She was tried and sentenced to 10 years in prison, with Carnegie himself attending the trial to examine the promissory notes, outraged because he thought they were poorly made and because he had not signed a note “in the last 30 years.” In her opinion, if they had looked for him immediately, she would never have gone this far.

This time, Cassie would never leave behind bars. Nationally famous, nicknamed the ‘Finance Witch’ and ‘Queen of Crooks’, she was in fragile health, and prison only worsened her condition. She suffered a “nervous breakdown” that left her blind. She died on her 50th birthday as a result of heart and stomach problems. Eternalized in pop culture, she is the basis of the mysterious Maud Beaton, who disappeared for now in The Gilded Age. Apparently, Agnes and Oscar will not get rich again… but Maud will one day pay for the scam.

Edited in 2025: As we saw on the third season of the series, Maud, or “Dolly Trent”, was briefly back and still leaving a trail of destruction in her way. She was “found” by Larry Russell at a gentleman’s club known as the Haymarket. His visit to the house of ill repute was fairly innocent (he was attending a party but not doing anything), but his willingness to help Oscar – telling him where to find Maud – caused a major crisis between him and Marian.

Nevertheless, Oscar does go and confront Maud/Dolly, who, in her turn, explains that all of Oscar’s fortune is truly gone, as she was merely a pawn in the scheme and tells a very sad story of abuse herself. Oscar is sympathetic to her, yet again, and instead of reporting her to the police helps her to escape her abusers, buying her a ticket to leave New York and start again. Too kind? Sure, that leaves an open door for her return, even if by then Oscar will surely be a married man and rich again. That’s another story.

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