America had Tokyo Rose and Great Britain had Lord Haw Haw.  William Joyce was born in Brooklyn.  His Irish immigrant family moved back home when he was a child.  His family was anti-independence and he joined the British Intelligence agency as a teenager.  He participated in the Irish War for Independence.  He was friendly with the Black and Tans which was an organization of Irish police who supported the British occupation.  They were notorious for extrajudicial executions, arson, and police brutality.  He was implicated in the murder of a priest and although it could not be proved, he was discharged from the army due to being only 14.  By this time he had become a fan of fascism and joined the British Union of Fascists (BUF) in 1932.  He turned out to be a talented speaker and rose to Director of Propaganda.  He moved the party to  more emphasis on anti-semitism.  In 1937, he was ousted from the party in a turf war with its founder.  In the summer of 1939, he and his wife emigrated to Germany and he became a German citizen.  He got a job with Radio Hamburg as a propagandist.  He and several other radio personalities began their broadcasts with “Germany calling, Germany calling”.  They became known collectively as Lord Haw Haw, but Joyce was the only one who became famous.  For six years, he tried to reduce British morale with exaggerated reports of aircraft and shipping losses and other war reports that painted a rosy picture of the war.  He also blathered about blaming the Jews for the war and warning about communist takeover of Eastern Europe.  He was a fanatic who broadcasted all the way to the fall of Hamburg on April 30, 1945.  His last report closed with “Heil Hitler and farewell.”  At that point, he and his wife fled to a small town and tried to blend in.  However, his name was on a list of the most wanted and he was arrested by the British, after being shot when he reached for a fake passport.  He survived to stand trial on three counts.  He was convicted of one –  being a traitor for broadcasting propaganda for the enemy.  He was defiant to the end when he was hanged.

https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/william-joyce-capture-and-execution

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_Haw-Haw


0 Comments

I would love to hear what you think.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.