Molly Pitcher (American Revolution)

Mythic heroine of the American Revolution. Molly Pitcher, according to the legend, was a cantiniere who put down her pitcher and took the place of her wounded husband, William Hays, at an artillery position during the battle of Monmouth on June 28, 1778. Molly reputedly took the rammer staff from Hays and rallied the flagging American artillerymen. According to some embellishments, Molly returned to find her husband wounded after carrying an injured soldier to safety. General George Washington rewarded her with a gold coin, or perhaps a sack of them, and promoted her to the rank of sergeant.

According to Linda Grant De Pauw, this is all a fabrication. The first written mention of this heroine of Monmouth appeared in 1851 and she was not identified as Molly Pitcher until 1859. The character was not specifically identified until 1876. That year, Wesley Miles of Carlisle, Pennsylvania, claimed that his grandfather’s maid, a Mrs. Mary Hays McCauley, had been the heroine of Monmouth. McCauley had probably served in some military capacity during the Revolutionary War. She received a pension from the state of Pennsylvania in 1822 "for services rendered." She had, however, requested the pension only because she was the widow of a soldier. De Pauw believes that citizens of Carlisle invented McCauley’s past to embellish the renown of their town (De Pauw 1998, 126-130).

According to De Pauw, despite the legendary nature of the Molly Pitcher story, two men present at the Battle of Monmouth recounted that women served in the battle. One woman was seen passing ammunition at an artillery emplacement, and another replaced her wounded husband in the infantry. These two women provide some basis for the story of Molly Pitcher. According to De Pauw, however, Mary Hays McCauley was in all probability not Molly Pitcher.


Mary Ludwig Hays—one of the women on whom the legend of Molly Pitcher might have been based—at the Battle of Monmouth during the American Revolution.

Mary Ludwig Hays—one of the women on whom the legend of Molly Pitcher might have been based—at the Battle of Monmouth during the American Revolution.

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