Stenhouse.1 KATHERINE OSWALD, WITCH. 339
The same Sir John seems to have possessed
property in East Lothian.
In 1413-4 Gulielmus de Edmonstone, scutger,
was a bailie of Edinburgh, together with William
Touris of Cramond, Andrew of Learmouth, and
William of the Wood. (? Burgh Charters,? No.
It was on Edmonstone Edge that the Scots
pitched their camp before the battle qf Pinkie, and
when the rout ensued, the tremendous and exulting
shout raised by the victors and their Spanish,
German, and Italian auxiliaries, when they mustered
on the Edge, then covered by the Scottish tents,
was distinctly heard in the streets of Edinburgh,
five miles distant.
In 1629 the ?Judicial Records? tell us of
certain cases of witchcraft and sorcery as occurring
in the little villages of Niddrie and Edmonstone.
Among them was that of Katherine Oswald, a
generally reputed witch, who acknowledged that,
with others at the Pans, she used devilish charms
to raise a great storm during the borrowing days of
1625, and owned to having, with other witches and
warlocks, had meetings with the devil between
Niddrie and Edmonstone for laying diseases both
on men and cattle.
She was also accused of ?bewitching John
Nisbett?s cow, so that she gave blood instead ol
milk. Also threatening those who disobliged her,
after which some lost their cows by running mad,
and others had their kilns burnt. Also her numerous
cures, particularly one of a lad whom she
cured of the trembling fever, by plucking up a
nettle by the root, throwing it on the hie gate, and
passing on the cross of it, and returning home, all
which must be done before sun-rising ; to repeat
this for three several mornings, which being done,
he recovered.
XXI.)
?? Convicted, worried at a stake, and burnt?
A companion of this Katherine Oswald, Alexander
Hamilton, who confessed to meeting the devil
in Saltoun Wood, being batooned by him for failing
to keep a certain appointment, and bewitching
to death Lady Ormiston and her daughter, was alsa
? worried at a stake, and burnt?: (? Spottiswoode
Miscellany.?)
Regarding the surname of Edmonstone, 1632,
Lord Durie reports a case, the Laird of Leyton
against the Laird of Edmonstone, concerning the
patronage of ? the Hospital of Ednemspittal, which
pertained to the House of Edmonstone?
The defender would seem to have been Andrew
Edrnonstone of that ilk, son of ?uniquhile Sir
John,? also of that ilk.
The family disappeared about the beginning oj
the seventeenth century, and their land passed into
the possession of the second son of Sir John
Wauchope of Niddrie, Marischal, who was raised to
the bench as Lord Edmonstone, but was afterwards
removed therefrom, ?in consequence of his opposition
to the royal inclinations in one of his votes as
a judge.? His daughter and heiress mamed Patrick,
son of Sir Alexander Don of Newton Don and
that ilk, when the family assumed the name of
Wauchope, and resumed that of Don on the death
of the late Sir William Don, Bart.
The estate of Woolmet adjoins that of .Ednionstone
on the eastward. According to the ?New
Statistical Account,? it was granted to the abbey of
Dunfermline by David I. It belonged in after
years to a branch of the Edmonstone family, who
also possessed house p,roperty in Leith, according
to a case in Durie?s ? Decisions ? under date 1623.
In 1655 the Laird of Woolmet was committed
to ward in the Castle of Edinburgh, charged With
? dangerous designes and correspondence with
Charles Stuart ; ? and in I 670 several cases in the
Court of Session refer to disputes between Jean
Douglas, Lady Woolmet, and others, as reported in
Stair?s ? Decisions.? \
Wymet, now corrupted to Woolmet, was the
ancient name of the parish now incorporated with
that of Newton, and after the Reformation the
lands thereof were included in Tames VI.?s grant
to Lord Thirlstane.
The little hamlet named the Stennis, or Stenhouse
(a corruption of Stonehouse, or the Place of
the Stones) lies in the wooded. hollow through
which Burdiehouse Bum flows eastward.
In the new church of St. Chad, at Shrewsbury,
in Shropshire, there lies interred a forgotten native
of this hamlet-atl architect-the epitaph on whose
massive and handsome tombstone is quite a little
memoir of him :-
? L J ~ ~ ~ SIMPSON,
?? Born at Stennis, in Midlothian, I 75 5 ; died in this
parish, June rgth, 1815. As a man, he was moral,
gentle, social, and friendly. In his professional
capacity, diligence, accuracy, and irreproachable
integrity ensured him esteem and confidence wherever
he was employed, and lasting monuments of
his skill and ability will be found in the building
of this church (St. Chad?s), which he superintended,
the bridges of Bewdley, Dunkeld, and
Bonar, the aqueducts of Pontoysclite and Chirk,
and the locks and basins of the Caledonian Canal.
The strength and maturity of his Christian faith
and hope were seen conspicuously in his last
illness. To his exemplary cbnduct as a husband
