Christmas in the Trenches, The True Story

The Remnant ^ | 12/23/17 | Jennifer Rosenburg

[vooch]

The sociopaths in gov’t wanted the bloodletting to continue so they did everything possible to destroy the Christmas Peace.

Gov’t leadership doesn’t give a hoot about soldierss lives. Washington is the same as the others. Just take a gander at the zillions of homeless veterans wandering our streets. That’s all one needs to know about Washington’s true respect for the military.

[bigdaddy45]

The military brass took care of this on subsequent Christmas’s to make sure it didn’t happen again. If I was a General in 1914, in quite sure I would have opposed my soldiers playing games and consorting with the enemy.

[Terry Mross]

Right now I’m watching Joyeux Noel on TV.

[sergeantdave]

“If I was a General in 1914, in quite sure I would have opposed my soldiers playing games and consorting with the enemy.”

And if the soldiers on both sides continued the 1914 Christmas Truce beyond Christmas, the war would have ended early in 1915.

[concentric circles]

Christmas in the Trenches - John McCuthcheon

[marktwain]

It was the young men on both sides who pushed for war. The old generals did not want it.

Wise leaders on both sides tried to stop it. But the young men (plenty of them on both sides) pushed for war, for glory, status, and booty.

In general, it is the young men who push for war, and the older generation that cautions against it.

[DuncanWaring]

And the war would grind on for nearly another four years.

Killing, on average, roughly 10,000 men a day.

Every day, seven days a week, 52 weeks a year.

Europe never recovered.

[dfwgator]

Europe never recovered.

It sure didn't, WWII was merely the piling-on.

[21twelve]

The way the war was going in the trenches, the few days of a truce probably didn’t make a huge difference - although probably on the men’s will to fight. (”Wait - those other guys aren’t monsters...”)

I’m sure glad that George Washington didn’t cross the Delaware just to share a pint with the Hessians though!

Hmm - maybe the Allies should have rolled barrels of beer over to the German trenches.

[Ciexyz]

How moving. 103 years ago and the story still touches the soul.

[2001convSVT]

“And if the soldiers on both sides continued the 1914 Christmas Truce beyond Christmas, the war would have ended early in 1915.”

Well said, and no Hitler.

[Eric Pode of Croydon]

And no Stalin either. Would that all the men in the trenches had downed arms and gone home.

[Atticus]

Strange Meeting
BY WILFRED OWEN
It seemed that out of battle I escaped
Down some profound dull tunnel, long since scooped
Through granites which titanic wars had groined.

Yet also there encumbered sleepers groaned,
Too fast in thought or death to be bestirred.
Then, as I probed them, one sprang up, and stared
With piteous recognition in fixed eyes,
Lifting distressful hands, as if to bless.
And by his smile, I knew that sullen hall,—
By his dead smile I knew we stood in Hell.

With a thousand fears that vision’s face was grained;
Yet no blood reached there from the upper ground,
And no guns thumped, or down the flues made moan.
“Strange friend,” I said, “here is no cause to mourn.”
“None,” said that other, “save the undone years,
The hopelessness. Whatever hope is yours,
Was my life also; I went hunting wild
After the wildest beauty in the world,
Which lies not calm in eyes, or braided hair,
But mocks the steady running of the hour,
And if it grieves, grieves richlier than here.
For by my glee might many men have laughed,
And of my weeping something had been left,
Which must die now. I mean the truth untold,
The pity of war, the pity war distilled.
Now men will go content with what we spoiled.
Or, discontent, boil bloody, and be spilled.
They will be swift with swiftness of the tigress.
None will break ranks, though nations trek from progress.
Courage was mine, and I had mystery;
Wisdom was mine, and I had mastery:
To miss the march of this retreating world
Into vain citadels that are not walled.
Then, when much blood had clogged their chariot-wheels,
I would go up and wash them from sweet wells,
Even with truths that lie too deep for taint.
I would have poured my spirit without stint
But not through wounds; not on the cess of war.
Foreheads of men have bled where no wounds were.

“I am the enemy you killed, my friend.
I knew you in this dark: for so you frowned
Yesterday through me as you jabbed and killed.
I parried; but my hands were loath and cold.
Let us sleep now. . . .”

[SunkenCiv]

• Christmas on the Battlefield - The 1914 Christmas truce. [2001]
• 'No shoot' on Christmas Eve, 1914 [2001]
• Christmastime 1914: Soldiers Halted War for Day of No Hate [2002]
• WWI - THE CHRISTMAS TRUCE, 1914 [2002]
• The Christmas Truce [2003]
• Last survivor of 'Christmas truce' tells of his sorrow [2004]
• Last survivor of 'Christmas truce' tells of his sorrow (1914 - 1942 - 2004) [2004]
• The Ghost of Christmas Past, The Christmas Truce of 1914 [2004]
• Last allied witness of WWI Christmas truce dies [2005]
• Peace Breaks Out on Christmas Eve [2005]
• THE CHRISTMAS TRUCE OF 1914 [2005]
• Joyeux No"l (A Movie about the WWI Christmas Truce) [2006]
• The Christmas Truce of 1914 [2008]
• This Week in History: The Christmas Truce of 1914 [2011]
• How English and German soldiers bonded during WWI Christmas Day Truce by telling jokes about the [2014]
• The Spirit of the 1914 Christmas Truce [2014]
• 'I shall never forget it': 100 years since WWI Christmas truce [2014]
• PHOTOS: Soldiers in Afghanistan play soccer in memory of World War One truce [2014]
• FReeper Canteen ~ The Christmas Truce ~ 02 January 2017 [2017]

[ConservativeMind]

SunkenCiv, Merry Christmas!

[AdmSmith]

This is mostly a myth:

That said, while some fraternization did occur between British and German troops on December 25, 1914, evidence for it is highly anecdotal. Moreover, the French were in no mood to drink and be merry with the Germans, who were occupying a good chunk of French soil, not to mention that in the five months leading up to Christmas, 300,000 French soldiers died trying to keep even more of their country from falling into German hands. Fraternization incidents between French and Germans were very much the exception that first war Christmas.

Despite this, European footballers have commemorated the Christmas Truce in their own way, while the British and German military have even held a centenary football match to celebrate the much-mythologized event. The Christmas Truce has always been a particularly British affectation, the football match being an indication of the fair-play and good-sporting values of the British generation that waged — and, as few seem to remember, won — the Great War. In a similar fashion, the 36th (Ulster) Division went “over the top” on the first day of the great Somme offensive, July 1, 1916, led by a football kicked out by a lead battalion, only to be mowed down, counting among the 57,000 British troops who fell dead or wounded that terrible day.

The Christmas Truce idea is beloved by many, beyond football fans, for its hint that, beneath the horror, British and Germans were just ordinary men cast into the maelstrom of unprecedented bloodshed. From there it’s easy to reach notions that, but for nasty generals, all might have ended with “average men” coming together to end the madness. In the background, a very furry John and Yoko are encouraging “Hair Peace, Bed Peace.” The appeal of this, a hundred years on, when Britain and Germany are together in the European Union, is humane and understandable. However, we must not get carried away by the power of pleasant myth-making.

https://20committee.com/2014/12/24/the-1914-christmas-truce/

[Mr Rogers]

"Reading the diaries of Great War soldiers, as I have done for decades, you realize that, despite the claims of Lennon or Lenin, quite a few soldiers actually enjoyed the war and wanted to defeat an enemy they increasingly hated. This was by far the most exciting thing to ever happen in the lives of millions of average working men..."

Well, my Dad was in WW2 & Korea & died in Vietnam. And he HATED war. He only spoke of war a couple of times before leaving for Vietnam, and then only a few sentences. One was, "You're tired; you're dirty; you're hungry. But you have a job to do and you do it." Then he got up and left the room.

Maybe it was different in WW1...or not!

[SunkenCiv]

That doesn't have credibility, looks like the author is from the "Lies of History" school of propaganda. Anecdotal? Yeah, so is courtroom testimony. The event was clearly and consistently described in anecdotes by participants who survived long anough to tell people about it. It happened early in the War, just months after its start, and was attested by British and Germans.

[bitt]

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