What about the tortures of the Spanish Inquisition?

You have probably read many imaginary descriptions of that tribunal which pretend to be history. However let us be quiet about torture inflicted by Catholics four hundred years ago. Seventy years ago a young servant girl was transported for life to Tasmania for scorching linen whilst ironing, and that from England three centurie£ after the Reformation! We are rather in a glass house. In 1848 things occurred in Norfolk Island in the name of gentle English Protestant enlightenment which would make your hair stand on end. Here are the words of a document presented to Sir William Denison, of N.S.W.: “Floggings of the utmost brutality are incessant, as also the infliction of the ‘Spread Eagle,’ a species of racking and gagging with an instrument which cuts the tongue and mouth. Women are tortured by confinement in irons, iron collars around their necks, chained to the floor, and left on bread and water.” And all this for the crime of stealing a tea-pot or a coat. These prisoners were our fellow Englishmen. Five are named from Middlesex; three from Surrey; others from Essex, Stafford, and Gloucester. Please don’t ask me about the Inquisition. It makes me look up the records of what was done in the name of England after she had abandoned Catholic principles, and blush for our race.

Radio Replies Volume 1 by Rev. Dr. Leslie Rumble MSC and Rev. Charles Mortimer Carty