Tamsin Blight (1798–1856), called locally Tammy Blee, was the best-remembered of the Cornish pellars — the conjurors, charmers and white witches of the far west who undid the spells of others and dealt in cures and charms. From her home at Helston she was sought out by fishermen wanting protection at sea, farmers with sick beasts, and the bewitched wanting their ill-wishing lifted; young women came to learn the name of their future husbands.
The story
Her fame was such that, on her deathbed, the sick are said to have been carried to her on stretchers and laid beside her, only to rise up cured and walk down the stairs. A darker Cornish tale, 'The Ghost of Stythians', remembers her raising a dead woman's spirit in the churchyard to reveal where hidden money lay, working within a charmed ring and calling on the spirits of fire, air, earth and water amid groans and crashing. Tamsin Blight preserves the living memory of Cornish folk-magic, where the line between healer and witch was one the community itself was content to leave blurred.