Woman of the Century/Lasell Carbell Pickett

PICKETT, Mrs. Lasell Carbell, author, born in Chuckatuck, Nansemond county, Va.. in 1848. She became the wife of Gen. George E. Pickett on 15th September, 1863. a short time after his famous charge at Gettysburg and the three-day conflict which linked his name to the line of heroes crowned with national homage. At the time of her LASELL CARBELL PICKETT. marriage, Mrs. Pickett was a beautiful girl of fifteen. Her trousseau was smuggled across the lines in bales of hay, and the girlish bride-to-be, taking her fate in her own hands, donned the garb of an old country woman, who sold vegetables to the soldiers, and through strategy reached the camp of General Pickett, who was eagerly waiting for his young bride. From the day of her marriage she shared every phase of army life in camp and in battle, by the side of the hero whom she worshiped. When the war was over, an effort was made to take from General Pickett the privileges given him by the Grant-Lee cartel, and General and Mrs. Pickett went to Canada. Without money and far from friends, it was for the heroic woman to show her indomitable courage. She obtained a professorship in belles-lettres and took care of her family, and General Grant insisted that the cartel should be honored, and the General and his family returned to their home. General Grant then tendered General Pickett the position of Marshal of Virginia, but he chose to accept a situation in an insurance company in Norfolk, with a large salary. Then gladness and peace came to the wife and mother, but only for a little while, and she was left a heart-broken widow with the care of an orphaned son. Again her courage shone out. The sympathy of the South was aroused, and a subscription was started with eight-thousand dollars from one State, and pledges of thousands more from the devoted comrades of her dead hero. Hearing of that plan to put her above the anxiety of temporal want, Mrs. Pickett resolutely declined to accept financial aid, and soon secured a small government position sufficient to support herself and son. In 1891, after recovering from a distressing accident, she was threatened with total blindness. As with one heart, the South gave her assurances of sympathy and support, and messages flashed over the wires that she had only to command Pickett's old comrades, and they would rally to her aid. To her belongs the honor of uniting the Blue and the Gray in fraternal bonds. She has been the messenger of peace, trying to reconcile the two factions and ridge over the chasm once so broad and deep. No woman to-day is more widely known and honored than Mrs. Pickett. Beautiful still, attracting by her grace and dignity the worthy and illustrious of all circles; gifted with intellect and known as an author, though only by her pen-name, she commands admiration everywhere. With health broken and the almost total loss of her sight, she retains her position in the clerical service of the government, in Washington, and honestly earns her own living, when she could have been heir to the liberality of the South.