In the spring of 1662, Elspeth Hay, a resident of the parish of Ayton in Berwickshire, became ensnared in the legal machinery of the Scottish witch trials. The records indicate that her involvement with the courts began in early March, a period marked by a surge in such investigations across the region. On the 3rd of March, 1662, Elspeth provided a formal confession to the authorities, a statement that served as the primary instrument in documenting her alleged activities before the local judiciary.
Following this confession, the legal process moved toward a final resolution. By the 4th of April, 1662, the case against her, registered under reference C/EGD/1469, reached the trial stage (T/JO/886). While the specific minutiae of the court proceedings—the depositions of witnesses or the precise nature of the charges brought against her—remain absent from the surviving records, Elspeth’s case stands as a stark illustration of the mid-seventeenth-century judicial response to witchcraft. Within the space of a single month, the transition from confession to trial reflects the swift and systematic nature of the legal procedures employed in the Scottish borders during this era.