Previously unseen German accounts of the First World War’s Christmas Day truce have come to light over 100 years on
Unseen diaries of German soldiers recounting the WWI Christmas Day truce in 1914 shed new light on ceasefire as they write about exchanging gifts and singing ‘beautiful’ carols
- British historian Anthony Richards pored over hundreds of German diaries
- One soldier described truce as ‘miracle’ and called British Tommies ‘brothers’
- Another wrote of how the two warring sides sang ‘beautiful’ Christmas songs
Harry Howard – Daily Mail Oct 1, 2021
Previously unseen German accounts of the First World War’s Christmas Day truce have come to light over 100 years on.
British historian Anthony Richards has pored over hundreds of German diaries from the First World War to shed new light on the temporary ceasefire in 1914.
The fascinating accounts include one by a soldier who described the truce as a ‘miracle’ and called the British Tommies his ‘brothers’.
Another wrote of how the two warring sides treated each other as human beings, exchanged gifts and sang ‘beautiful’ Christmas carols.
British and German troops met up together in No Man’s Land.
But the truce did not sit easy with some of the German officers who were concerned about the affect befriending the enemy would have on the men.
One officer wrote how he was torn between rejoicing at the moment of mutual peace and being appalled at the fraternisation with the enemy.
The variety of accounts, which are both amusing and poignant, feature in Mr Richards’ new book, The True Story of the Christmas Truce.
The author said he wanted to write a book which analysed the truce from a German perspective, while tackling some ‘myths and inaccuracies’ about what took place.
He said: ‘Now that none of the original combatants from the First World War are alive, we rely more than ever on those invaluable written and recorded experiences.
‘For these reasons, the main encouragement for me to write this book lay in the fresh availability of a wealth of rarely seen German accounts of the Christmas Truce, many never before translated into English and some not previously published.
‘The story of the truce has traditionally been a very British-centric one, but for the first time we can begin to look more at the event as a shared experience between two opposing sides.’
One account is from Lieutenant Fritz Jung, of the 10th Jager Battalion, who recounted hearing Christmas carols sung in the trenches.
He described walking around ‘without a fear in the world’ knowing they were not going to be targeted by British snipers.
He wrote: ‘All of a sudden, towards 4am we could hear music ringing through the early morning, floating in from the Saxon trench where they had formed a band that was playing the most beautiful Christmas carols.
‘Each song was received with loud shouts of ‘Hurrah!’ coming from the English side.
‘There too it eventually quietened down, dawn broke and all around us was peaceful.
‘We could take walks outside without a worry in the world and for the first time we were able actually to roam around the area, taking it all in, while usually we weren’t allowed even for a moment to put our head above the parapet for fear of being targeted by English sharpshooters.
‘We also used the time to fix our parapet and anything else which needed mending.
‘Tommy on the other side did the same. Above all we needed to bury the dead who were still lying in the field.’
Another German soldier described the occasion as ‘miraculous’ as they waved at each other and exchanged gifts ‘as if they had been brothers’.
Rubert Frey, of the 16th Reserve Infantry Regiment, wrote: ‘It was miraculous! These were Englishmen, English soldiers of whose existence we only knew based on their iron-wrapped missives, and now, here we were face-to-face.
‘The two of us who had been lying opposite each other gun in hand were now waving to each other, exchanging gifts as if we had been friends, brothers even!
‘Well, indeed, isn’t that precisely what we were! At that moment we were friends, no longer German and English – we were human beings!’
However, the German superiors, like their British counterparts, felt very uneasy by the break in fighting as they feared it could cause their men to ‘lose their killer edge’.
German officer Otto Hahn wrote: ‘The question remains whether one should rejoice or be appalled.
‘I myself am really and profoundly happy about this peace lasting one day.
‘For effect, I make it crystal clear to the men that such a thing is not allowed, not even for the one Christmas Day. It is too dangerous, I say, etc. etc.
‘But deep inside me, I think it is beautiful. But yes, lucky that they are being replaced.
‘It would be hard to shoot at people, or knock them dead with our rifle butts, or pierce their bodies, if one had exchanged cigarettes and food items with them just before.
‘So, this is not what is allowed to happen. Yet, this is what the mood is like around here, and here perhaps it is shown more clearly than elsewhere * so, feelings have to be suppressed.’
In his following entry, he revealed it was ‘business as usual’ on Boxing Day as both sides peppered each other with shell fire and a grenade exploded near him.
He writes: ‘For some time our artillery has made it quite clear, and openly so, that this ‘Christmas Peace’ of ours has come to an end.
‘Heavy weapons are being deployed in close proximity to my quarters, with my windows rattling from the impact.
‘I suspect that this is being done under orders to make it obvious to everyone that the truce is now over for good.
‘Looks to me like the enemy has also returned to his routine and all seems to be back to apple-pie order.
‘Boom, this very second a grenade has exploded just nearby, proving that all is running according to plan.’
The True Story of the Christmas Truce, by Anthony Richards, was published by Pen & Sword on September 1 and costs £20.
My father came to London from Ireland in 1948 to work ‘on the buildings’. At the time there were many German prisoner-of-war in London. I can clearly remember one of them on a street corner in Battersea selling children’s dancing toys he had whittled out of wood I remember the crowd being friendly.
He told me how shocked he was at the attitude of “cockneys” towards these men. He said they were more than friendlt .. how he got the sense that they … I remember him struggling to find the words … kind of … looked up to them.
On most warring sides in recent history captured soldiers who were from the ordinary ranks would be held in the guardhouse while the officers were taken to the officer’s mess. What’s that if not fraternising? I’d say no officer’s mess whether commandeered abroad or built on a home base has proper holding facilities.
They said it would be over by Christmas, and it was, but not for long. The resumption is a pivotal moment away from a peaceful time. War had seemed impossible until it came.
We three troops of European
soil are.
Baring guns we traveled so far.
Locked and loaded, propagandized and goaded.
Following Satan’s star.
Star of plunder, star of blight
Guide us to thy perfect night
Friends lie bleeding, life receding
Following wondrous star
If only they could have taken it upon themselves to shoot the officers, bid the opposition ‘farewell’, then take their firearms home with them,
(all from every nation) & wipe out their respective governance too.
That was -as is now- the best solution.
The British (((Elite))) soon put a stop to fraternising… insisting The Slaughter MUST GO ON!!
Sic semper erat, et sic semper erit.
This was very moving as a lad i asked many men who fought in the war about this
and also about the angels of ons now dismissed by historians
but both english and german soldiers testified to the angels being seen in the sky
Fact is we are both anglo saxon nations, both brothers under the skin
moshe solomons said quote
it was the triumph of the jew to set the two anglo saxon nations at each others throats twice in one century
it was always the generals,officers + bosses
send them into hellfire like its today + tomorrow.
The enemies of Christ Jesus wants to destroy Christian nations by pitting one against the other. They, the anti-Christs, were quite successful in Europe with both world wars fought mostly on on European soil, but did not achieve their desired goal of total victory. They now have set their eyes on doing the same thing again, but this time their focus is on the USA, the last bastion for Freedom in the western Hemisphere. But they will fail again!
@prof susan? foster so as a “lad” you asked the questions; what are you a tranny or just a bullshitter? What’s with the professor bit? Or is it me that’s wrong and you’re really the original boy named sue?
If you’re going to believe in a Jewish ‘savior’ for hundreds of years, I suppose you can be commanded by your Jewish Overlords to blindly slaughter your own race..
at school i made a freind of a girl we home to her house for tea
she said dad rarely goes out as he was in a crashed plane in germany and badly burnt
i was 15 i could not help staring at him, he told as an englishman bombing the people of germany when he crashed he tought he would be for it
but he said the german people were so kind and helped him a lot
many brits changed sides and supported hitler against the jew
dont forget Hitler came as a saviour of all anglo saxon peoples both Germans and English
Absolutely true! They are our brothers and sisters, if only the Anglo saxon Germans and English had united England and Germany two mighty God fearing nations the world would be a much better place to be.
“Jesus as the head of our church” The Angels would have sung from heaven hallelujah!!! If, If, If only!
My grandfather Charles Astbury Smith was a POW in WWI. This happened during the Ludendorff Offensive of 1917. He and an officer were boiling a kettle over candle when a German officer jumped into the trench with a revolver and invited them to surrender. My granddad was told not to go for his gun by his superior and “not be fool”; thankfully he complied. Being only 18 or so himself, he was shocked at the younger age of the Germans who were naturally very shook up by the British bombardment when he was taken behind their lines.
He worked in German jam factory. The owner/manager(?) died and was apparently held in high regard by the men. My dad told me that his dad was pallbearer at the funeral. He later met my granny, whose fiancé had been previously killed in the war. By such slim margins do we come into being…
He later died at the young age of 47, no doubt affected by the war, including being buried alive for three days once. After he passed, the bed received a load of shrapnel that had worked its way out of his corpse. As a youngster he had received a silver medal for never missing a day at school…
He was of course a victim and not a hero. The conscientious objectors were the brave ones.
@seemore….Just as the Jews killed their Messiah (Jesus), so did the Aryans kill theirs (Hitler). The thing is though, when you kill your Messiah, they don’t come back…
A needless war instigated mainly by the money power which enabled them not only to make vast profits on the blood of suffering of so many innocents and at the same time to spawn of communism in Russia and spread it wherever they could. They were with their profits to totally manipulate Western markets, and in effect they caused the Fascist and Nazi reactions everywhere, and ultimately they caused and are responsible for WWII. Yet, after all of this time there remains no historical or moral accountability simply because that same power controls all of our nations, the media and most historical accounts. It is the same money power behind the UN & WEF Agendas and the entire Covid fraud and heinous vaccination programs.
Christians are pierced by bullets, shrapnel and bayonets like their master with the bad thorns, nails and spear example. Add hypodermics, now.
There is no evidence jesus was Jewish other than the word of a jew so that should give a good clue
ALL WARS ARE BANKERS WARS
@Dave…If you didn’t know, your own Hebrew Bible proves Jesus was Jewish. From the Jew (New) Testament we learn that he was circumcised (Luke 2:21), called ‘Rabbi’ by his disciples (Mark (9:5), attended Synagogue (Luke 4:16) observed Passover & Hanukkah (Matt 26:17/John 10:22) & taught ‘Salvation is from the Jews’. (John 4:22)..
You might want to educate yourself better..
Nico X on October 2, 2021 at 9:49 pm
Try to study a wee bit more and learn of the word Jew first being used in late 1700 English poetry.
Jesus was never a “Jew” as He was Judaen/Nazarene.
The lie of bibble fame of INRI is just a lie of Sanhedrin of old/new as they are children of father of lies are the now we call Jew.
@O…more like Jehovah’s star…
Nico X on October 2, 2021 at 9:49 pm
There is no excuse for ignorance in our world Nico and if you choose ignorance in our world now you are a fool.
Egyptian carved history of their world in stone to our world some 4000 year ago and have no mention of slave whinging Jew or Israel.
You Nico/Mr Silly rely on garbage printing which was invented by Caxton and honed by Readers Digest who created Holo in late 60’s America/our world.
Carved in stone fool as Said fake Jew wandered and whinged his whinge as they did throughout our eternity.
To Murt–you think the Reader’s Digest invented the Holo? False rumours of it were already being circulated in the camps during the war. There was no evidence, just the murmur “we all knew it was happening”. Jewish paranoia is always “happening”.
You see, even after their own Hebrew Bible proves them wrong, these Christians like Murt still persist in their Semitic delusions…thus there’s no point in debating these people…
i am 78 years old i cannot see the small print
i have had one catarct remoed
and instead of young lady it came up as lad
thnkyou for pointing out my mistaks
the only weak point the german generals,
admirals +officers did not see were the were
the firemen on the coalship navy. they
refused taking orders from officers. the
navyofficers dreamed their dream of heroic
sinking in endbattle . their dreams did not
come true : no fire under the boilers.
so communist agitators found their way.
To Lewis…
True that but my mention of Readers Digest is as when academia America was being dumbded down RD was dumbing down American readers.
As for films out of camps after the war. It was no accident Alfred Hitchcock filmed rail cars full of bodies.would be a strange turn indeed if said rail cars were full of German pow.
As for you Nico.
You see, even after their own Hebrew Bible proves them wrong, these Christians like Murt still persist in their Semitic delusions…thus there’s no point in debating these people…
This piece of non thought does not need debate as nonsense would stand on but one leg to be ignored.
And then as I bethought as this old Donkey, Navvie, Paddy dug tunnel in Esher as gooish BBC lived there and we were not allowed to go overground with heading as it would upset gooish englander.
Likewise as we were not allowed to dig overground in Golders Green where stupid londondenglish now not notice hebe on police minister for gooish Londoner.
Cromwell smiles on you now England. A big wide smile paid for by gooish…
@prof Susan Foster I am sorry I had a go at you I just can’t do with folk professing to be what they are not. I apologise.
More the pithy really as it so many year to nam for grunt to invent fragging…
Oh wait ye as Frag back then was officer fraged soldiery from behind who faltered…
Upstairs, downstairs as gooish banker sent flower of Europe to die on Flanders Field as we remember you by Poppy.
Good night grandad as I hold gongs of then as you were an unknown professional soldier…
prof susan foster on October 3, 2021 at 2:39 pm
i am 78 years old i cannot see the small print
i have had one catarct remoed
and instead of young lady it came up as lad
thnkyou for pointing out my mistaks
Missed yer post but this post made me smile in a good way.
My blessings be upon you, my blessings…
As an young Cockney inquired of me as I cooked my steak… Why did you spit on yer steak Paddy.
Well to him I wondered, as would you now eat me steak if I were out of yer eyeshot…
Loved me old London Town.