Bay Ridge man gets new flag to honor army veteran dad
Tom Joyce was beside himself when the American flag that had draped his father Patrick’s casket was destroyed in a car fire. Patrick C. Joyce had served in the U.S. Army and the flag was presented to his family by a military honor guard at his funeral at Mount Saint Mary’s Cemetery in Queens two years ago.
“I kept the flag in the car and when the fire happened I thought, that’s it, I’ll never be able to replace that flag,” Joyce, a Bay Ridge resident, told the Brooklyn Eagle.
Patrick C. Joyce, who died two years ago at the age of 83, had been in the Army when he was a young man, serving mostly in France, according to his son.