Tamsin Blight
Tamsin Blight was a notable figure in 19th-century Cornwall, recognized for her healing abilities and her role as a "peller," someone who repels evil spirits. Emerging around 1830 from humble beginnings, Blight gained prominence by 1835, treating individuals from various regions, including the Scilly Isles and Swansea. She was married to James Thomas, another figure believed to possess magical powers, and together they were known for their remarkable healing practices, often involving the use of charms and grave items to protect against illness. Despite her contributions, Blight’s life was marked by challenges, including a tumultuous relationship with her husband, whose alleged misconduct led to their separation. Blight’s story reflects the societal fears of her time regarding malevolent forces and the reliance on folk practices for health and protection. Ultimately, she is remembered not as a figure of malevolence but as a healer who navigated the complexities of her era's beliefs and fears surrounding magic and illness.
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Subject Terms
Tamsin Blight
Cornish witch
- Born: 1798
- Birthplace: Redruth, Cornwall, England
- Died: October 6, 1856
- Place of death: Unknown
Cause of notoriety: Blight was famous for her reputed magic charms and powers to heal.
Active: c. 1830-1856
Locale: Cornwall, England
Early Life
Almost nothing is known about the early life of Tamsin Blight (TAM-sihn BLIT), and her feats, if not her existence, may be merely legendary. She most likely came from a poor family, perhaps from parents who taught her how to use various methods of repelling harmful spells and charms. She began her practice as a “cunning woman” about 1830. By 1835, she was well known as a “peller,” that is, as one who repels evil spirits.
Healing Career
Blight was a woman with great power to heal. In 1835 she married James (Jemmy) Thomas, a widower who also was believed to have magic powers. He and Blight moved to Helston, where they were known to have cured hundreds of people in the area. People would bring their loved ones on stretchers to visit them, and often after treatment the sick person would get up and walk away. Those who sought Blight and Thomas’s healing powers came from as far away as the Scilly Isles, Hayle, St. Ives, and even Swansea. They would line up outside Blight and Thomas’s door, often leaving with bags of earth, teeth, or bones taken from a grave. These were to be worn around the neck, to prevent or cure fits. Sometimes the afflicted received words written on parchment. Stones carved by the peller were also to be worn around the neck.
There was at that time a practice in the area known as ill-wishing. If someone ill-wished another, terrible things could happen to the object of the ill-wisher, and Blight and her husband were often called upon to undo an ill-wish. One legend has it that a miner scolded Blight because he thought she had taken some coals from his mine; the next day, things did not go well for the miner. He realized that he had been ill-wished and went to Blight to have the ill-wish undone. Blight was paid well for the undoing. Once a shoemaker refused to mend her shoes, saying she did not pay well. Blight ill-wished him, and eventually the shoemaker had to go out of business. People feared ill-wishing, and it was believed the practice could even cause death.
Later in life, Blight separated from her husband, apparently because of his bad reputation. There was a warrant for his arrest by the magistrates of St. Ives, but Thomas fled the area and did not return for two years. He was said to be a drunken, disgraceful, beastly fellow. His conduct was said to be outrageous, and he allegedly slept with male clients (a taboo practice that would have shocked and outraged this society). However, he was supposed to have been able to cure every human ailment as well as those of cows, pigs, and horses. He died in 1874, eighteen years later than Blight.
Impact
The story of Tamsin Blight reaffirms how strongly people in her time and locale feared unknown spirits, such as the evil eye, and ill-wishers. Blight lived at a time when very little was known about medicine, when people trusted in what would now be called magic. Blight is one in a long history of wise women who played an important part in the well-being of agricultural societies. Overall she was not an evil woman but rather one who helped people overcome their fear of evil magic.
Bibliography
Davies, Owen. Cunning-Folk: Popular Magic in English History. New York: Hambledon, 2003. An examination of the tradition of cunning folk and the key social roles they played in nineteenth century British life. The author estimates that there were thousands of such individuals across the British isles. Illustrated, with a detailed bibliography and an index.
Guiley, Rosemary Ellen. The Encyclopedia of Witches and Witchcraft. 2d ed. New York: Checkmark Books, 1999. Provides an alphabetical listing of spells, charms, and names of witches and various types of witchcraft from many parts of the world.
Jones, Kelvin I. The Wise Woman. Corpusty, Norwich, England: Oakmagic, 2004. Details the history of the cunning, or wise, woman throughout British social history. The author demonstrates how the wise woman was instrumental to the well-being of agricultural societies in an age when medicine was in its infancy. The work contains an exhaustive list of herbal and magical cures used by wise women and a compendium of their methods of divination.
Semmens, Jason. “’Whyler Pystry’: A Breviate of the Life and Folklore-Collecting Practices of William Henry Paynter (1901-1976) of Callington, Cornwall.” Folklore 116 (April, 2005): 75-94. Much of what is known about Blight comes from Paynter, who lived in Cornwall from 1901 to 1976. He was a member of Old Cornwall societies, a movement to collect and preserve stories or memories of the old practices of healing and of the lifting of spells.
‗‗‗‗‗‗‗. Witch of the West. Plymouth, England: Jason Semmens, 2005. The story of Blight (here known as Thomasina), greatest of the Cornish “cunning folk” in the nineteenth century, provides social history as well as a tale of witchcraft.