The Martyrdom of William Joyce

William Joyce is too often remembered as “Lord Haw-Haw,” a name that seems like a joke—and is. However, those who really know who this man was will recognize that he was an exceptional individual, who suffered martyrdom for his pro-Western beliefs.

Intellectually gifted William Joyce had a family tree to be proud of. Theirs was a family whose merits had given an entire region of Galway, Ireland their name: “Joyces’ Country.” Their roots traced back to William the Conqueror’s colonization of medieval England and the later crusades. Among Joyce’s ancestors were three archbishops, three founders of the Dominican College at Louvain, several mayors of Galway, an historian, a 19th-century poet-physician, an American revivalist preacher, and the noted author and poet James Joyce. William’s father, Michael Joyce, as a 20-year-old British citizen (Ireland was then ruled from Westminster), had emigrated to the United States in 1888. Four years later he renounced his British citizenship and became an American citizen. He was very successful in his trade and returned to Ireland in 1909 to live in comfort.........