Skegness Magazine

THE capture of William Joyce, the notorious “Lord Haw-Haw” is but one of the many exciting incidents which have crowded into the life of Mr. Alexander Adrian Lickorish, manager of the Seacroft Hotel, Skegness.

(news article written in 1956)

His career in the hotel catering trade has taken him to most of the exclusive playgrounds of Europe, while his fluency in German and French caused him to be drafted abroad during the war for an adventurous term with Army Intelligence.
It is not surprising that he devoted his life to the hotel trade,  for his father was a director of Fleet Street’s Practical Press, publishers of “The Caterer and Hotel Keeper” journal, where he began work as an office boy after leaving St. George’s College, Weybridge, Surrey, at the age of 18.
Two years later he launched out on his own and became apprenticed to a chef at the Grand Pump Room Hotel, Bath.
Two years later he had forsaken his chef’s apron for the uniform of a waiter and served at the Cafe de la Paix.
TO GERMANY
The surroundings were glamourous, but the payment for his services was not so appealing. He earned no set wages at all, and, together with the other waiters, was expected to survive on tips which amounted to 5s. a day.
At that time he was paying 25s. a week for one room in a simple hotel, and could not have survived if it had not been for an allowance from his parents.
A year later he left with a fluent knowledge of the French language and returned to London to work as a waiter in the well – known Hungaria Restaurant.
Next he decided to master the German language and travelled to the Continent once again, this time to Badelilsen, near Hanover, Germany. He became receptionist in the huge Bader Hotel and remained for one year.
He was there on the night the Germans invaded Austria and once came into contact himself with the dreaded Gestapo. The occasion was when he was crossing the German frontier. The Gestapo searched him from top to toe, leaving him with nothing but 10s.

AT LONDON HOTEL
In Lucerne, Switzerland, he worked as a receptionist on the management side of the Hotel Dulac for a year and was there during Chamberlain’s visit to Munich.
He left Lucerne and took over the position of receptionist at the famous Carlton in London’s West End.
He became friendly with stars of the theatrical world such as Evelyn Laye and Edmund Gwynn and principals from “No No Nannette,” the hit musical show of the time.
War broke out and Mr. Lickorish joined the London Scottish Regiment.
He never served with this Regiment, but was posted instead to the Gordon Highlanders in Aberdeen, where he became a full sergeant.
ARNHEM LANDING
Later he was commissioned from Sandhurst to the Royal Armoured Corps, attached to the First Airborne Division, and served in a parachute landing on Arnhem.
On that historic day he managed to bring his men back safely with only two wounded.
Returning to Britain, they were stationed at Ruskington, near Sleaford, and Mr. Lickorish made his first contact with the name of Skegness. To-day there is a plaque in Ruskington’s church commemorating the First Airborne Division.
The most interesting part of his war experiences were yet to come.
Because of his mastery of languages he was made a member of the Intelligence Corps and crossed the Channel again to Brussels.
In his new job, censoring Press reports, he was called upon to work with famous war correspondents, among them Vaughan Thomas and Richard Dimbleby.

RADIO CENSOR
In addition, Mr. Lickorish and his fellow officers were required to censor all radio programmes put over by captured Radio Hamburg and to censor German entertainments and literature.
The next destination for Staff-Captain Lickorish was Flensburg, on the Danish frontier, where he and a fellow intelligence officer, Lieut. Geoffrey Perry, were ordered to censor a newspaper.
And it was on one of these journeys to the Danish town that Lickorish and Perry captured William Joyce.

Capture of Lord Haw-Haw

It was about 5 p.m. on the evening of May 28th. 1945. when the two officers entered a wood about a mile on the German side of the frontier.
A peasant called out: “I can show you where you can get some wood.” They halted, because wood was in great demand at their electricity-starved base at Flensburg.

Something about the peasant’s accent set Capt. Lickorish’s mind working, and he realised he was William Joyce (pictured left).
The colleagues persuaded the man to join them in their wood-gathering and waited until he had both hands full of sticks. Lickorish took temporary cover behind their truck and covered Perry as he addressed the “peasant” with: “You don’t happen to be William Joyce, do you?”
Capt. Lickorish heard three gunshots and he came out from behind the truck to see Joyce lying unconscious on the ground. Perry had shot Joyce, who had made a bid to elude capture. They searched through his pockets and found a passport bearing the name Wilhelm Hansen and another with a photograph marked William Joyce.
Mr. Lickorish received a signal from the War Office on the following Saturday ordering him to be in London on Monday morning. As the chief witness of identification he was transferred to M.1.5, and attended Joyce’s first appearance at Bow Street and his trial at the Old Bailey. Joyce was finally hanged for treason.

Picture below: William Joyce (Lord Haw-Haw) lying in an ambulance under armed guard before being taken from British Second Army Headquarters to hospital. Source: Wikipedia

HIS HOBBIES
At the end of the war Mr. Lickorish was demobbed from the Army with the honorary rank of Captain.
He managed the Crown Hotel, Woodbridge, the Grosvenor Hotel, Westcliffe-on-Sea, the Cairn Hydro, Harrogate, and finally came to the Seacroft Hotel four years ago.
Aged 41, he is married and has a daughter, Denise, who is eight. His wife, Heather, is the daughter of a London hotelier.
Mr. Lickorish is a member of the Hotel and Catering Institute. He gives valuable service to local hoteliers’ interests as secretary of Skegness Licensed Trade Association.
A busy man, he still manages to take a few hours for his hobbies, which are reading, playing golf and modelling. He is a member of the Seacroft Golf Club.

Background Information

“Lord Haw-Haw” was the voice of “Germany Calling”, a German propaganda radio broadcast during the Second World War.  Though the voice of “Lord Haw-Haw” was executed by various persons, William Joyce invariably took the role.

It was Lord Haw-Haw who made the famous broadcast that the Germans had sank the HMS Royal Arthur in 1940, which caused much amusement amongst the locals because, as we know, HMS Royal Arthur was a naval CAMP not a ship!

Video of what is said to be Haw-Haw’s last broadcast before the capture of Germany in 1945 by the Allied Military forces.