By Thomas D’Agostino

This story is an excerpt from the book Strange New England by Thomas D’Agostino and Arlene Nicholson published by Arcadia Publishing.

New England is full of tales regarding witches, wizards and other seers who made their living through the telling of fortunes, but few ever reached the celebrity of Marblehead’s own Moll Pitcher.

Moll Pitcher was the granddaughter of famed Marblehead wizard John Dimond who was known to magically guide ships to safety during storms from atop Burial Hill in the small village. Moll was born Mary “Moll” Dimond in 1736 in a house called the Old Brig at the foot of Burial Hill.

Moll was of medium stature, possessing an unusually large head, with a pale, thin face, arched eyebrows and long brown hair. She was also a very wise and intelligent woman who had an uncanny knack for reading people by how they moved or acted. 

Moll married a shoemaker by the name of Richard Pitcher on October 2, 1760, and had four children, John, Rebecca, Ruth and Lydia. They later moved to nearby Lynn, where she soon gained a reputation far and wide for telling fortunes. 

From royalty to rags, they came seeking the talents of Moll. Her cottage at the base of High Rock created the most appropriate atmosphere for her craft. She made predictions of events that would transpire up to ten, even twenty years later. It was said that she even predicted the outcome of the Battle of Breed’s Hill. Generals such as Burgoyne, Pitcairn, Gage and even Washington were among those who heeded her predictions. 

Sailors and sea captains came to see Moll before setting sail and would often postpone their journeys based on her predictions. In some cases, ships would sit at port empty for weeks until Moll gave a good prediction to sail. Nearly every port an American ship sailed into around the world knew of Moll Pitcher, and many would inquire of those who came from her jurisdiction of any news, good or bad. Business people often sought her advice before making important decisions. 

Moll used tarot cards and read palms on occasion, but her primary fortunetelling method was derived from tea leaves. She would boil the leaves and dump them into the client’s cup. From there, she would read the leaves that settled at the bottom of the cup. Their position revealed the fate of the inquirer. If the leaves fell scattered, the client would be unfortunate in love. If they fell crowded together, that meant happiness and wealth. If they arranged themselves in a series of lines, the client would live a long life and have many children. If but a few remained in the cup, the inquirer would die young. 

Whether or not her predictions held much preciseness is a matter of modern conjecture, but those who sought her wisdom in her day, took them as the wise words of a true seer. It is told that treasure hunters often sought out Moll for locations of lost booty. She would say something to the fact, “Fools, if I knew where money was buried, do you think I would tell you where it is?”

Moll Pitcher died on April 9, 1813, and was buried in the West Lynn Burial Ground. Her stone states her name, Mary Pitcher, with her birth date of 1738. Her original grave was unmarked until 1887, when a proper monument was erected in her honor.

Molly may have gone to live with the spirits, but her predictions live on in a book published in 1895 called The Celebrated Moll Pitcher’s Prophecies.