The Wishbone and Luck Bones

“it’s always successful anyhow tuh carry a wishbone.” That was the view of a Memphis informant, who kept his oiled with lucky oil, wished on it before leaving home, and laid it up at night where no one else could touch it (Hyatt 2385 · Memphis, Tenn. · informant 1524).

The black cat bone is the famous one. But Hyatt’s informants carried many other bones as luck pieces: the chicken’s wishbone, forked bones hunted for in frogs, fish and bats, and the bones of the dead themselves.

What it is

A luck bone is a bone kept on the person, or planted, to bring luck, win a lover, beat the law or ruin an enemy. Some were common kitchen leftovers. Others had to be dug out of a grave or taken from a body.

• Wishbone, pull bone or pulling bone: the chicken’s forked breastbone, best from a black hen or chicken.
• Forked bones from other animals: sought in frogs, fish and bats because they looked like the wishbone.
• Dead man’s bone: a finger joint, toe, rib or hand bone from a human corpse.

Hyatt himself pointed out more than once that no frog, fish or bat has a true wishbone. His informants went on finding one anyway.

What Hyatt’s informants said

Pulling the bone was a contest of luck. In Florida a black chicken was killed for its breastbone, and two people pulled it: “De one dat pull an’ break de most, splits de most on it, gits lucky, he’s lucky.” The winner sewed his piece up and carried it to every game after (Hyatt 1775 · St. Petersburg, Fla. · informant 995).

The same bone could find a husband. A Wilson informant said the pulling bone kept in the pocket brought luck, a job or found money, and that broken it told a girl her husband: “break it an’ stick it through de do’ at de first man dat come in. Dat’ll be yore husband” (Hyatt 13457 · Wilson, N. Car. · informant 1402).

The dead man’s bone worked in darker ways. A Waycross informant said a finger joint put in the mouth before entering a bank or a deal made the carrier invisible: “yo’ be nuthin but a shadah” (Hyatt 836 · Waycross, Ga. · informant 1097).

Variations

• The wishbone of a black hen pulled apart, the bigger end kept in the pocket for luck and to get out of jail (Hyatt 9023 · St. Petersburg, Fla. · informant 1031).
• A chicken luck bone nailed over the door with thirteen tacks to keep the law off a whiskey house (Hyatt 2456 · Richmond, Va. · informant 368).
• A turkey wishbone, or a chicken one, matched to the fork of a road while a woman wished for the man she wanted (Hyatt 8839 · Fayetteville, N. Car. · informant 1407).
• A toad frog left in a can on a red ant bed until only the skeleton remained, and the forked bone taken from it (Hyatt 9900 · Savannah, Ga. · informant 1269).
• A V-shaped lucky bone from behind a fish’s head (Hyatt 11638 · Memphis, Tenn. · informant 940).

What it was used for

Luck and gambling came first. An Ocean City informant spoke of dice carved from the hand bones of a dead man dug up in the cemetery, for payday dice games (Hyatt 1820 · Ocean City, Md. · informant 14).

Love was next. The frog bone hung in a woman’s clothes for two seconds was said to tie her. Getting free meant finding a second frog and giving her nine drops of tea made from its bone (Hyatt 9900 · Savannah, Ga. · informant 1269).

Protection was sold. A Charleston doctor told Hyatt how to get a bone from an undertaker during embalming and make it into a ring to sell for five dollars, which kept the wearer from all harm (Hyatt 1811 · Charleston, S. Car. · informant 512).

And the dead man’s bone killed. In Savannah the last rib on the left side of a corpse was cut in three, shaped into a cross, sewn in red flannel with black pepper, salt and graveyard dirt, and buried at the front steps. The informant’s next-oldest brother lived barely eleven days after it was laid (Hyatt 900 · Savannah, Ga. · informant 1279).

One man took a finger joint and a toe from the skeleton of a lynched man he found in a swamp, for success in underworld work. He kept it a while and gave it up (Hyatt 2354 · Waycross, Ga. · informant 1120a).

In their own words

“If yo’ kin hang it in ‘er clothes jes’ fo’ two seconds, why she’ll be crazy about chew.”

(Hyatt 9900 · Savannah, Ga. · informant 1269)

“A bone ring dey call it – and nobody kin harm you”

(Hyatt 1811 · Charleston, S. Car. · informant 512)

“Ah have tried dat once but ah didn’t make no luck at it”

(Hyatt 2354 · Waycross, Ga. · informant 1120a)

How it’s worked today

The wishbone is still a working luck piece in conjure. It is dried, dressed with a luck oil, wished on and carried in a mojo bag, or pulled between two people to see whose luck is stronger.

Chicken and turkey bones from the kitchen remain the everyday material. A black hen’s wishbone is still preferred where it can be had.

Human bone is now mostly bought rather than dug: old medical and anatomical specimens are sold openly in some places. The name dead man’s bone has also long been used for prepared powders and curios that contain no bone at all.

Learn the work

← Back to The Hyatt Files

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.