Was Edward Collins Tortured?

Edward Collins, an English merchant, was the great survivor of the Amboyna case. He confessed to an involvement in the plot and was found guilty alongside his countryment but was reprieved just before he was due to be executed due to an act of clemency. For the Prosecution, Collins is a vital support for the case. He was the one plotter who confessed without torture. In a case marked by the use of torture, Collins’ was uniquely important because his free confession of the key details of the plot without prompting served as counter to the charge that all of the evidence had been extracted by the use of the torture chamber. However when he returned to London, Collins claimed that he had in fact been brutally tortured and the Defense argued that he, like all the supposed plotters, was compelled to confess only after the brutal application of waterboarding.