Ward, WILLIAM, VENERABLE (real name WEBSTER) b. at Thornby in Westmoreland, about 1560; martyred at Tyburn, July 26, 1641. He was over forty when he went to Douay to study for the priesthood but no details have been preserved of his earlier life. He arrived there on September 18, 1604; received the minor orders on December 16, 1605; the subdiaconate on October 26, 1607; the diaconate on May 31, 1608; and the priesthood on the following day. On October 14 he started for England, but was driven on to the shores of Scotland, arrested and imprisoned for three years. On obtaining his liberty he came to England where he labored for thirty years, twenty of which he spent in various prisons as a confessor for the Faith. He was of zealous and fiery temperament, severe with himself and others, and especially devoted to hearing confessions. Though he had the reputation of being a very exacting director his earnestness drew to him many penitents. So mortified was his personal life and so secret his numerous charities that he was even accused of avarice. He was in London when Parliament issued the proclamation of April 7, 1641, banishing all priests under pain of death, but refused to retire, and on July 15 was arrested in the house of his, nephew. Six days later he was brought to trial at the Old Bailey and was condemned on July 23. He suffered on the feast of St. Anne to whom he ever had a great devotion. An oil portrait, painted shortly after the martyrdom from memory or possibly from an earlier sketch, is preserved at St. Edmund’s College, Old Hall.
EDWIN BURTON