Velvalee Dickinson (October 12, 1893 – ca 1980) was an American spy convicted of espionage against the United States on behalf of Japan during World War II.

Known as the "Doll Woman", she used her business in New York City to send information on the United States Navy to contacts in Argentina via steganographic messages.

Elizebeth Friedman's cryptanalysis unit at US Coast Guard Headquarters in Washington examined the letter and broke the code, concluding that the "dolls" were actually three warships and that the "doll hospital" was a West Coast-based shipyard where repairs were made, while the "fishing nets" and "balloons" disclosed information about coastal defenses and other critical information on the West Coast.

During that time, four more letters were sent to the same Buenos Aires address, a Señora Inés López de Molinali at 2563 O'Higgins Street.

One of the letters, supposedly sent by a Mary Wallace of Springfield, Ohio, did indicate her home address – 1808 E High Street – but had been postmarked in New York, a place she had never been.

The letter corresponded to information that the destroyer USS Shaw, which had been damaged in the Pearl Harbor attack, completed repairs on the West Coast and was soon to rejoin the Pacific Fleet.

The FBI determined that the letter was written shortly after a convoy of ships had arrived at the Mare Island Naval Shipyard in Vallejo, California.

But it is now repaired ... [t]hey could not get a mate for this so a plain ordinary warship is being converted into a second aircraft carrier ..." The information matched damage done to the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga, which had seen repairs in the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard before being transferred to the Naval Base at San Diego, California.

Naval authorities confirmed to the FBI that a ship damaged at Pearl Harbor was in Puget Sound for repairs and would be completed around the time stated in the letter.

Based on the results of the investigation, FBI agents arrested Dickinson on January 21, 1944, in the bank vault where she kept her safe deposit box.

A portion of the money had been in the hands of a Captain Yuzo Ishikawa of the Japanese Naval Inspector's Office in New York before being transferred to Dickinson.

On July 28, 1944, a plea bargain was made between the U.S. Attorney's Office and Dickinson in which the espionage and Trade Act indictments were dismissed and she pleaded guilty to the censorship violation and agreed to furnish information in her possession concerning Japanese intelligence activities.

She claimed the information compiled in her letters was from asking innocent and unsuspecting citizens in Seattle and San Francisco near the location of the Navy yards there, as well as some details from personal observation.

Upon sentencing, the court commented: It is hard to believe that some people do not realize that our country is engaged in a life and death struggle.

After her release, she changed her name to Catherine Dickerson and maintained a friendship and secretarial relationship with Eunice Kennedy, attending her wedding in 1953.