The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1882-11-24
By Telegraph.
THE JOYCE MURDERERS
Four of the Joyce Family MurdererS
Sentenced to Death-..D "Details
Of the Crime.

DUBLIN, Nov. 21.-The remaining four men,
charged with completely in the murder of the
Joyce family at Maamtrasna, who had not yet
been brought to trial, to-day pleaded guilty
and threw themselves on the clemency of the
crown. They were sentenced to death.
The locality in which the crime was com
mitted on the night of the 18th of August last
lies in the widest and loneliest dis
trict of the most remote regions of
the Joyce country, Connemara, and is
almost inaccessible, owing to the mountain
fastness and miles of lake around which it is
situated From Cong it is twelve miles dis
tant, and from Mann it is nearly an equal dis
lance, these being the two villages nearest to
the scene of the murders. 1t is within view of
the waters Of Tough Mask, beneath
whose CLASSY surface were last Jan
uary found the bodies of Joseph and
John Huddy, the two bailiffs who were
captured by band lying in ambush and
tied together-whether first killed remains
unknown-placed in sack and flung into the
Tough. Here also Mr.. George Robinson,
the agent of Colonel Clements Nord Lett
rims heir), was fired at, but escaped as
sassinahon, and not ten miles distant
lies the ground where Lord Mountmorres
was shot dead, and the place where the boy
Gibbon was assasinated. The cabin lies in a
hollow at the foot of q mountain, and is sur
rounded by high mountain ranges, the stu
alton being one of the loneliest and most in
accessible imaginable The land here forms a
portion of the estate of Colonel Clements
ing some 300 or 400, have, with one or two
trifing exceptions, not paid single farthing
of rent during the last three years. John
Joyce was one of these tenants. He was a
man of about IS years of age and some con-
siderable time ago held a farm from the
murdered Earl of Leitrim at a district in the
Joyce country called Derry Park, but
being q widower with four chill
dren, he married the poor woman who
shared his tragic fate. She was a widow, and
at the time of the wedding was in possession
of the farm at Maamstrasna. Since then he
had lived peaceably upon the farm, his moth
er, Margaret Joyce, s. years of age, his
daughter, Margaret Joyce, Is years of age,
and Patrick Joycs II years of age, residing in
the same house with himself and wife Bird
get His eldest son, Martin q young man of
about 20 years, lived at Clonbur, being SER
want in the employment of Mr.. George Hare,
farmer, and to this circumstance he owes
his escape from being one of the victims of
the bloody tragedy
1t appears that the Joyce family retired to
bed at their usual hour. All was quiet for the
first few hours till about o'clock in the morn
ing, when as Michael related with his dying
breath, he heard Shots The door was taken
off it's hinges and number of armed assassns
poured into the cabin. The father was shot
kl0 Iox- e I. 4
wife was bludgeoned to death, and then the
inner room was entered The feeble old
grandmother was attacked and her skull was
crushed by rain of blows which left bone,
blood and brain one red mass of pulp Michael
was shot in the stomach; his sister was struck
on the head by blow which left her dead and
Patrick, the younger child, was badly beaten
over the head and face with a stick. Michael
wounded fatally and his bowels protruding
through bullet rent in the stomach, crawled
out of the bed in which lay the corpses of his
grandmother and his sister. He found his
father lying dead on the floor, and his step
mother dying in her bed. Terrified and faint,
afraid to return to that horrible bed, reeking
with gore and CHASTITY with its dead, that he
had left In the inner room; trembling with
dread to remain by the naked corpse of his
father, feeling the pangs of death himself he
crept in by the side of his fathers wife She
lay moaning, but though her head and face
had been beaten into bloody mass, she did
not die till some time subsequently.
Hours slowly passed before assistance
came. AT length the son of a neighboring
farmer named Collius, accompanied by two
women named O'Brien, who were coming to
the cabin to borrow pair of cards for wooden
spinning, arrived, and discovered the condi-
ton of the the hapless victims.
The following story is current in the West
of Ireland: Mrs. Joyce, one of the murdered
family, witnessed the sinking in the lake of
the bodies of Lord Ardilaun's bailiffs, but was
so terrified that for some time she did not ven
ture to tell any one what she had seen. One
night, however, she could no longer keep it to
herself, and described to her husband what
she had seen certain men do This was over
heard by their son, who shortly after, being
bullied at school by another boy,
cried out, 81 suppose you want to murder me
and throw me into the lake as your father did
the hailffs." The boy having repeated this to
his father the latter and his confederates de-
termined upon massacring the whole family
of the Joyces in order to put out of the way
such awkward witnesses of their former
ur1riIt