In the spring of 1624, Katherine Blair, a resident of the coastal town of Barrowstouness in Bo'ness, Linlithgow, became the subject of a legal proceeding that would lead her into the formal machinery of the Scottish witch trials. On 30 March 1624, her case—catalogued in the records as C/EGD/961—was brought forward, initiating a series of judicial inquiries. Katherine was subsequently transferred to the royal burgh of Linlithgow, where her trial, documented under references T/LA/76 and T/LA/77, took place before the authorities.
The proceedings reached a significant juncture when a formal confession was recorded, a document that served as a central component of the judicial process during this period. Through this testimony, Katherine’s account of her actions and circumstances became a permanent part of the legal record in Linlithgow. While the sparse archives of the seventeenth century leave us only with these administrative markers, the documentation of her case provides a clear glimpse into the structured, bureaucratic reality of the early modern Scottish legal system as it navigated allegations of witchcraft.