In the autumn of 1649, legal records from the Presbytery of Earlston in Berwickshire document the formal proceedings initiated against Katharine Frater. On the 20th of November, Katharine was brought before the authorities to answer to the accusations leveled against her, as noted in the judicial case file C/EGD/2042. During this period of intense judicial scrutiny in Scotland, the escalation of such allegations often followed rigorous ecclesiastical and civil protocols, positioning Katharine within the broader administrative machinery of the mid-seventeenth-century witch trials.
The subsequent trial, recorded under the reference T/LA/2069, marked the progression of Katharine’s case from initial accusation to formal legal hearing. While the existing records provide the essential framework of her prosecution—documenting her residence in Earlston and the precise timeline of her involvement in the judicial system—they serve as the primary testament to the lived reality of an individual caught within the ecclesiastical and state structures of her time. These documents remain a vital component of the historical archive, offering a window into the intersection of community suspicion and the formal administration of law in Berwickshire during the late 1640s.