In the spring of 1662, the village of Samuelston in Haddingtonshire became the epicentre of a legal upheaval that swept through entire households, including that of Patrick Cathie. Patrick, a married man, found his life and liberty abruptly curtailed when he and his family were collectively denounced as witches. The catalyst for this accusation was the testimony of James Welch, a youth whose own involvement in the proceedings led to imprisonment on account of his age, yet whose confessions were afforded significant weight by the judicial authorities of the time.
The legal machinery moved swiftly against Patrick as the accusations levelled by Welch were formalised into case C/EGD/518. Over the subsequent weeks, the focus of the Haddington authorities shifted toward the trial process, reflected in the procedural entries T/JO/1793 and T/LA/1317. As a figure caught in this wider network of denunciations, Patrick was drawn into a rigorous investigation that prioritised the testimony of his accuser, ultimately marking his place within the broader historical records of the Scottish witch trials.