Paisley witches

Eleven-year-old Christian Shaw, daughter of the Laird of Bargarran, complained of being tormented by some local witches; they included one of her family's servants, Katherine Campbell, whom she had reported to her mother after witnessing her steal a drink of milk.

The following day, 22 August, Shaw became violently ill with fits, similar to the symptoms reported a few years earlier in the American Salem witch trials of 1693.

The church set up a weekly fast and prayer meeting at Bargarron House, and Shaw's father appealed to the authorities that those named by his daughter as tormenting her should be arrested.

[4] Their advocate, James Roberston, argued that the prosecution was obliged to rule out the possibility that the events surrounding the case could be explained by natural causes before a conviction could be safely secured.

James Hutchison, the minister of Kilallan, about 5 miles (8.0 km) north of Paisley, delivered a sermon to the commission; it was commonplace at the time for a member of the clergy to preach to the court in Scottish witch trials, and they were not infrequently instrumental in securing convictions.

He had a neckcloth tied around his neck and attached to the fireplace by a stick, however he was in a seated position on a stool, and those who found him stated the mechanism by which he had died was not sturdy enough to support his weight.

With his cell locked, and window boarded, it was unclear how his death was accomplished[7] The remaining seven were hanged and then burned on the Gallow Green in Paisley on 10 June 1697[4] the last mass execution for witchcraft in western Europe.

[9] The anxiety induced in Christian Shaw by Katherine Campbell's curse may have brought on a conversion disorder in the young girl, the modern name for what was once known as hysteria.

[12] In 1839 a small hole was discovered in the wall of Shaw's bedroom at Bargarran House, which by then had become a local attraction, through which an accomplice may have passed the items she supposedly removed from her mouth.

[9] Shortly after the trial in 1697 the former Scottish Secretary of State James Johnstone observed that "the parliaments of France and other judicatories who are persuaded of the being of witches never try them now because of the experience they have had that it's impossible to distinguish possession from nature in disorder".

Her Bargarran trademark thread became a mark of quality, and others in the area began to emulate her techniques, starting an industry in which Paisley once dominated the world, and which shaped the town's history.