Torture Essay Research Paper We went to

Torture Essay, Research Paper

..We went to the torture room in a kind of solemn

precession, the guards walking ahead with lighted candles.

The chamber was underground and dark, particularly near

the entrance. It was a vast shadowy place and every device

and instrument of human torture was there. They pointed

out some of them to me and said I should have to taste

them. Then they asked me again if I would confess. .I

cannot.., I said... (Abbott, 1)

Those words were spoken by John Gerard, a Jesuit priest accused of spreading

Catholicism in England. And in 1597 he was captured, taken to the Tower of London

and .put to the question.. Whatever the country, whatever the crime, one could see the

authorities. dilemma, when suspicion, strong and sometimes reinforced by evidence,

would point to an individual, who usually vehemently denied all accusations. Yet the

truth had to be determined. While in an age where social conditions were brutally harsh,

where epidemics of fatal diseases decimated the population and violence was almost a

way of life, what more natural than to attempt to extract a confession by using force.

Torture which is understood to be the torment and suffering of the body in order to elicit

the truth. It.s concept is based on two fundamental facts, first, that we all have

imaginations. (Abbott, 1-4) Torture is a vile and depraved invasion of the rights and

dignity of an individual. It is a crime against humanity, for which there can be no

possible justification.(Innes, 7)

Torture was used as early as the 11th century, as evidence shows that William the

Conqueror ordered the maiming of criminals, while Henry I ordained that those guilty of

counterfeiting the nations currency, would be punished by having their right hand

severed and then afterwards castrated. The human anatomy seems to have been

expressly designed to be pierced. The human body.s soft, yielding flesh, with

vulnerable parts such as fingers and toes, ears and nose.s, sticking out, positively

invited the attention of a torturer.s keen blade and sharpened spike. (Abbott, 67) Since

the primary principle of torture is to inflict pain or, at the very least, to threaten pain,

therefore exploiting the fear of it. Probably the most infamous instrument of torture in

Medieval England was the rack. (The Tower…..,2) It is believed that the rack was

introduced into England around 1420 by the Duke of Exeter, who was constable of the

Tower of London at the time. (Innes, 87-88) Although many variations of the rack have

been used throughout the centuries, the basic principle has always been the same. The

victims. hands are secured by ropes to a beam at one end, and their bodies gradually

stretched by ropes attached to their feet. At first, they resist the stretching, not only with

the muscles of their arms, and legs but also with their abdominal muscles. Then

suddenly, the muscles of their limbs give way, first in the arms and subsequently in the

legs: the ligaments, and then the fibres of the muscles themselves, are torn. Further

stretching ruptures the muscles of the abdomen, and finally torn from their sockets.

(Innes, 123) If they did not die of their injuries, they were often so injured that they

could not take part in their public confessions. (Tower of….., 2)

Persuasion by means of pressing usually ended in death, hardly desirable in court

cases where confessions and names of accomplices were required. However in the 16th

and 17th centuries, a device was used which, while not endangering life in any way,

positively encouraged the victim to reveal everything he knew, whether true or

imagined. The instrument was known as the Boot. As it.s name implies, the boot was

designed to torture a prisoners legs and feet, and the device was so effective that even

the early stages of it.s application caused injuries so harsh that a hasty confession was

usually the result. the most common form of the boot required the victim to sit on a

bench, to which he was securely tied. An upright board was then placed on either side of

each leg, splinting them from knee to ankle; the boards were held together by ropes or

iron rings within a frame. With the victims legs now immovable, the torture begun with

wooden wedges hammered between the two inner boards and then between the outer

boards and their surrounding frame, compressing and crushing the trapped flesh.

(Abbott, 30-31) The torture of the boot was described by those who witnessed it as it as

.the most severe and cruel pain in the world.. Indeed, as Bishop Burnet wrote: . When

any are to be stuck in the boots, it is done in the presence of the council, and upon that

happening, almost all offer to run away. The sight is so dreadful that, without an order

restraining such a number to stay, the press would remain unused.. (Innes, 3)

Torture remained strong throughout the Middle Ages and the Renaissance period,

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