In the spring of 1662, the village of Over Saltoun in Haddington became ensnared in a widespread judicial investigation that drew a married woman identified only as the wife of Thomas Finlason into its orbit. The legal proceedings against Finlason originated from the accusations of James Welch, a youth whose involvement in the local witch-hunt was significant despite his own exclusion from formal trial due to his age. Although authorities deemed Welch too young to face the court himself and placed him into custody, his detailed confessions were treated as credible testimony, serving as the primary instrument for identifying and denouncing numerous individuals within the community.
Following the initial denunciation, the case against Finlason was recorded under the archival reference C/EGD/507, with official procedures formalised on April 17, 1662. Her trial, documented under T/LA/1342, unfolded during a period in which the testimony provided by Welch carried substantial weight with the Haddingtonshire authorities. As the legal machinery moved forward, the records confirm her status as one of several people swept into the reach of the court by the accusations of this young informant, marking a singular point of intersection between communal suspicion and the formal judicial processes of the mid-seventeenth century.