Nails, Needles and Pins

“Any time yo’ nail, de nail hurt ’em an’ de blood poison will kill ’em.” A Wilson, North Carolina informant said that about a ring of nine nails driven into the ground around a house and cursed.

Nails, needles and pins are the sharp hardware of conjure. Hyatt’s informants drove them into trees, doorsills, photographs and the ground; dropped them into bottles of urine; stuck them through cloth dolls; and set them out to catch witches by night.

What it is

The point pierces, fixes and holds. A nail driven home nails a person down, in place or in pain. A needle or pin stuck in a figure carries the hurt to the one it stands for. Set out in numbers, the same points become a fence that nothing can pass.

Informants were particular about the kind. New nails and new needles for some work, rusty nails for others, square cut nails, ten-penny nails, gold-eye needles, brass pins, horseshoe nails from the blacksmith, and nails pulled from a coffin. Nine was the usual count.

What Hyatt’s informants said

A Washington informant described the slow drive into a green tree. A square cut nail was started in the bark on a Sunday morning and tapped each morning, until “the ninth day you drive it up to the head”. After those nine mornings, the person named went crazy, drifting (Hyatt, Vol. 1 · Washington, D.C. · informant 642).

The coffin nail had a power of its own. An Elizabeth City informant said a man should take his from a woman’s coffin and a woman from a man’s, and with it could do anything they wished, whenever they wished (Hyatt 1806 · Elizabeth City, N. Car. · informant 438).

In Mobile the nails themselves drew a coffin. An outline was made under the side of the house like a grave, and nine nails were driven around the heart so the victim would drop dead off their feet (Hyatt 1803 · Mobile, Ala. · informant 697).

The variations

• The doll. A Philadelphia doctor had a deserted wife make a black cloth baby, stick a new needle and a new pin through its eyes, pin it over the door and curse it on entering, to bring her husband back (Hyatt 197 · Snow Hill, Md. · informant 97).
• Needle water. A dozen needles soaked ten days in water, and the water given to someone to drink as a deadly poison (Hyatt 35 · Waycross, Ga. · informant 1067).
• The bottle. Nine tacks, nine needles and nine nails dropped head foremost into a bottle of urine, telling them aloud what work to do (Hyatt 4271 · New Orleans, La. · informant 877).
• The gate. Nine ten-penny nails and nine gold-eye needles on a can of lye buried in the centre of the gate, to turn back anyone trying to hurt you (Hyatt 1378 · Waycross, Ga. · informant 1102).
• The law. Nine nails driven in a cross into each door to keep the police away (Hyatt 2145 · Little Rock, Ark. · informant 897).
• Dreams. Two crossed matches with a needle stuck through, laid point down under the pillow, so the dead who start telling you something in a dream come back and finish (Hyatt 60 · Jacksonville, Fla. · informant 596).

Against the witch

Pins and needles were a standard trap for the night-riding witch. Nine new nails or nine new needles were bottled to catch her (Hyatt 491 · Sumter, S. Car. · informant 1377).

A Richmond informant set nine pins and nine needles in a bottle, alternated so “you put haids down and tails up”, to keep the witch from the house (Hyatt 538 · Richmond, Va. · informant 433). Another had a woman pin her own breast so the witch would draw blood on herself (Hyatt 485 · Snow Hill, Md. · informant 97).

In their own words

“You can take a coffin nail and do anything that chew wish to do”

(Hyatt 1806 · Elizabeth City, N. Car. · informant 438)

“a dozen needles an’ put ’em in watah an’ let ’em stay in dere ten days”

(Hyatt 35 · Waycross, Ga. · informant 1067)

“Dat keep de policemen away”

(Hyatt 2145 · Little Rock, Ark. · informant 897)

How it’s worked today

Coffin nails and railroad spikes are still staple curios. Rootworkers drive them into tracks, photos and the corners of a property, both to pin an enemy down and to fix their own ground against intrusion.

Pins and needles remain the tools of doll work, and the witch bottle of pins, nails and urine is still made for protection and for tying a lover.

Nine remains the working number, and new hardware is still preferred for clean work, rusty for crossing.

Learn the work

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Source: Harry Middleton Hyatt, Hoodoo – Conjuration – Witchcraft – Rootwork, 5 vols., 1970-1978. Numbers refer to Hyatt’s own item numbers; the town and informant number follow. Written by Hoodoo Witch in our own words, with short quotations from Hyatt’s informants for reference.