German and British soldiers call a truce on the Western Front for Christmas
In September 1914, many people thought that the war that had just started would be over by Christmas. These hopes were dashed by the stalemate of trench warfare that ensued. The soldiers, exhausted by the ongoing fighting in muddy or icy trenches, were mostly aware of the Pope’s proposal to observe a truce on the “feast of charity”. Even before that, the guns had fallen silent to allow for recovery of the dead and wounded. Now the arrival of Christmas presents brought a joyful change to the otherwise bleak everyday life. On 24 December 1914, a number of German and British soldiers on individual sections of the front in Flanders – often less than a hundred metres apart – rose from their trenches, sang Christmas carols and even held a joint church service. Tobacco and even beer and pudding were exchanged, and the men compared family photos. It is unclear whether there was actually a football match, but it is likely that at least one rather disorganized kickabout took place.
The 100,000 soldiers – mostly Germans and Englishmen – who fraternized with their enemies were not punished and went back to shooting at each other the next day. Christmas 1914 remained an exception, and soldiers on both sides were threatened with court martial to prevent a repeat of the festivities. A German soldier who wrote to his parents telling them that he would “never forget Christmas 1914” did not survive the war. He was just one of more than nine million who died. A British survivor later told Parliament in London that the soldiers “would probably never have taken up arms again if it had been up to them”.
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