Lizzie Cabell
(Mrs. Albert Ritchie)
While she was ever superlatively attractive to men, she was yet a generous friend to women, and frequently avenged the slights to which she saw some plain woman subjected, for, besides the scintillating qualities that made her a popular idol she had many noble traits that commended her to a more profound and lasting admiration.
The toast which is more celebrated than any of her other equally clever utterances was offered at a supper at the Springs, given in honor of herself and another famous Richmond belle, Mary Triplett, the late Mrs. Philip Haxall. Miss Triplett had been asked to propose a toast and had declined. Mattie Ould, however, rose without hesitation, lifted her glass, inclined her graceful head towards Miss Triplett, and in her clear musical voice, said, "Here's to beauty, grace, and wit, which united make a Triplett." There was, indeed, a peculiar enchantment about all she did and said that seemed never to have belonged to any one else. Her dancing infused a new charm into the atmosphere of a ball-room, and as a horsewoman she possessed a skill and grace that few could rival.
Her horse once ran away with her in Richmond, just as the groom mounted her and before she had put her foot in the stirrup. It dashed off at top speed, running several squares through the residence district of the city, and then turned into a business street, where it rushed madly into a hack. The hackman, however, had seen it coming, and realizing that he could not get out of its way, he stood up, and throwing his arm around the rider's waist, he lifted her from the saddle as the horse crashed into the hack, partly demolishing it, and fell. A great crowd witnessed the rescue, and cheered lustily for the courageous old hackman. When Mattie Ould was recognized, however, the enthusiasm assumed a more substantial form, and the hands of many men went generously into their pockets. He was never forgotten, and as long as Mattie Ould lived she provided for him and his family, some of the many who had loved her keeping up the good work after she was gone.
Though she was the object of the ardent devotion of many men, she did not marry until she had passed her twenty-fifth year. It was rumored that she was engaged to a friend of her father's, a man many years her senior, and the indignation with which her father received the news of her marriage to Oliver Schoolcraft substantiated in many minds the report of the former engagement.
Her marriage occurred at the end of the summer of 1876, which she had spent with her grandmother at the White Sulphur Springs. Thither Schoolcraft, one of the wealthiest of the younger set of men who adorned Richmond life, had followed her, taking with him his own valuable horses and traps, with which adjuncts he was ever at her disposal. They drove over to Salem one day, and were quietly married there that evening, at the home of Mr. and Mrs. John A. McCall; one of Miss Ould's brothers and several of her friends witnessing the ceremony. As no preparation had been made for her marriage, she wore, instead of the conventional white satin, a simple gown of white organdy, set off with bands of black velvet.
Mary Triplett
(Mrs. Philip Haxall)