In the final weeks of 1663, the judicial machinery of Haddington turned toward Adam Gillies, a married man residing in the coastal burgh of North Berwick. On December 24, Adam was formally entered into the legal record under case file C/EGD/1889, marking the commencement of proceedings against him. At this time, the climate of suspicion surrounding witchcraft in Scotland remained potent, particularly in the Lothians, where local authorities were increasingly vigilant in their oversight of the community.
The legal process moved with deliberate formality, as Adam was subsequently brought before the Court of Justiciary under trial reference T/JO/1952. While the surviving documentation remains brief, it captures the essential administrative markers of his prosecution during that mid-seventeenth-century period. The records preserve his name as a subject of this judicial scrutiny, situating Adam within the broader history of the Scottish witch trials that persisted throughout the century.