Study Guide: The Christmas Truce of 1914
The Truce
The Christmas Truce of 1914 occurred during the Winter Solstice, when soldiers on many sides of the battle in many places along the Western Front put down their weapons and cautiously emerged from their trenches to celebrate together.
Perhaps it was inspired on December 7, 1914, when Pope Benedict XV suggested a temporary hiatus of World War One for the celebration of Christmas. Politicians of the various warring empires refused to create an “official” ceasefire, but the soldiers in the trenches declared their own truce. In the midst of the brutal and total war, the soldiers disobeyed their political and military masters, crossed into No Man’s Land, and celebrated peacefully with “the enemy.”
How the Truce Began
On Christmas Eve, German troops began singing Christmas carols. The Allied soldiers even reported hearing brass bands echoing from the German side. Soon English and French troops began singing songs in return. The soldiers called to each other across the lines—sometimes rude remarks, sometimes jokes. At one point, a German soldier called out, “Tomorrow you no shoot. We no shoot.”
"Tomorrow you no shoot. We no shoot."
Unknown WW I German Soldier
The next day, a few German soldiers emerged unarmed from their trenches and approached the Allied lines across No Man’s Land, calling out “Merry Christmas” in the enemies’ native language. Highly suspicious at first, English soldiers soon climbed out of their trenches to join the Germans between the lines.
Good Wishes
They exchanged presents of cigarettes, chocolate, champagne, plum pudding, and sang songs to each other. There is even a documented case of soldiers from opposing sides playing a good-natured game of soccer.
“Official” Reactions
The truce occurred only five months after the outbreak of the war, and before all sides realized the extent of the horrors to follow. Such celebrations may have been rarely repeated and when they did occur remained unreported due to threats of heavy disciplinary action by military officers.
Reports of the Christmas Truce did much to deflect the worst of anti-German propaganda among the English population. War managers on both sides, fearing that such events would reduce popular enthusiasm for the war, tried to prevent such truces from happening again. Despite this, there were many isolated incidents of soldiers holding brief truces later in the war, and not only during holidays.
The Live and Let Live System
In what became known as the ‘Live and Let Live’ system along quiet sectors of the front, brief pauses in fighting were sometimes tacitly agreed to, allowing both sides to repair the trenches and gather their dead.
“How marvelously wonderful, yet how strange it was. The English officers felt the same way about it. Thus Christmas, the celebration of Love, managed to bring mortal enemies together as friends for a time.”
Kurt Zehmisch, German Lieutenant
Christmas in the Trenches, by John McCutcheon
Legendary folk musician John McCutcheon presents the world’s most famous song about the Truce of 1914, “Christmas in the Trenches," as part of his Christmas in the Trenches Centenary Concert at the National World War I Museum.
Recorded December 19, 2014 in J.C. Nichols Auditorium at the National World War I Museum at Liberty Memorial.
For more information about the National WWI Museum and Memorial visit http://theworldwar.org.
Brothers in Arms (live in South Africa), by Dire Straits
On 11 June 1988 Dire Straits appeared on the stage at Wembley Stadium with Eric Clapton as a part of Nelson Mandela’s 70th Birthday Party.