In the early months of 1645, the judicial machinery of the Scottish state focused its attention upon Isobell Bigham, a resident of the burgh of Stranraer in Wigtown. As winter transitioned into spring, records indicate that the legal proceedings against Isobell commenced on the 25th of February. During this period of heightened religious and social scrutiny, such investigations were formal affairs, documented meticulously within the legal archives as case number C/EGD/1303 to ensure that the process adhered to the established administrative requirements of the era.
Following the initial inquiry, the matter progressed to a formal trial, indexed under reference T/LA/1094. Within the context of mid-seventeenth-century Wigtownshire, these proceedings represented a significant intersection of local governance and the prevailing legal statutes concerning witchcraft. While the sparse surviving records focus primarily on the bureaucratic identification of the case, they situate Isobell within a specific historical moment when the mechanisms of the Scottish courts were deeply engaged in the examination of those accused of illicit supernatural practice.