The Christmas Truce

What happened to them all in the next four years?

As dusk thickened on a cold Christmas Eve in 1914, some British soldiers noticed Germans putting small trees on the parapet of their trenches on the other side of no-mans-land. Some were illuminated with small candles. Most British soldiers had no idea what this meant, since decorating trees for the festive season was not yet common in Britain. Some even thought it was some kind of fiendish enemy trick. Then the Germans began singing.

Legend has it that the Germans sang Silent Night and this may well have been one of the carols they sang, but certainly not the only one. Eventually, they shouted across for the British to sing. The story goes that, since the British couldn't think of any carols, they replied with bawdy soldiers' songs. This seems unlikely and is probably a symptom of the British denial of sentimentality. In any case, songs were exchanged.

The next morning, more words were exchanged and a few brave souls, Germans initially in most reports, climbed out of their trenches. Others followed as curiosity at what the mostly invisible enemy might be like. Food, cigarettes and tobacco, the staples of most soldiers' lives, were swapped and photographs of home and family examined. Makeshift football (soccer) games were undertaken, although scorekeeping does not seem to have been very important.

As afternoon wore on, soldiers began to drift back to their own trenches. Some swore that they would not open fire the next day and some wildly optimistic individuals stated that this was the end of the war and soon they could call go home. Of course, the optimists were horribly wrong and the guns opened up with renewed fervor the next day—but what if they'd been right? What a Christmas that would have been!

All the best for our Festive Season to everybody.