In the early months of 1662, the judicial machinery of the Scottish state focused its attention upon the Isle of Bute. On January 28, Margret McNickell was formally identified within the legal records (C/EGD/1526) as a subject of investigation regarding the crime of witchcraft. At this time, the judicial climate in Scotland was particularly fraught, as the period of the 1660s witnessed a renewed wave of witch-hunting that reached into many of the country’s remote island communities. Margret, residing in Bute, became one of the many individuals caught in the intersection of local suspicion and the formal processes of the early modern court system.
Following her initial entry into the judicial record, the proceedings against Margret moved toward a formal hearing. The surviving documentation (T/JO/1892) confirms that she was subjected to a trial, the specific details of which mark her case as part of the significant legal activity involving accusations of sorcery during the seventeenth century. As with many who appeared before the courts during this era, Margret’s trajectory—from her residence on Bute to the formal courtroom setting—illustrates the administrative rigor with which the state managed the perceived threat of witchcraft in the years between 1563 and 1736.