The Incredible Christmas Truce of 1914.
Wing. Cdr. Arijit Ghosh +91 99809 96906
It was Christmas Eve 1914 and World War I, the ‘Great War to end all wars,’ had been raging for five months, with more than a million soldiers dead. A war that was to be ‘over by Christmas” – or so the troops had been made to believe.
When the sound of gunfire and exploding shells suddenly died away at midnight, the peaceful strains of Silent Night in German wafted across to the Allies in their trenches. Sung in an unfamiliar language, the much-loved notes came floating across the harsh, unforgiving landscape of no-man’s land. Soon the British joined in too, singing in their own language and the strange duet hung suspended over the battle-scarred trenches where lay the “living, dead and the damned,” in the words of a popular song by the Irish group Celtic Thunder.
And for a while the stench of fear and death faded, to be replaced by a spirit of camaraderie and good cheer.
At dawn, the first German soldiers bravely climbed out of their trenches, and approached the British lines, wary of being fired upon. Each side thought it to be a trick of some kind, ready to fire at the slightest provocation. Till they realised that the soldiers were unarmed and came in peace.
Soon a swarm of officers and soldiers from both sides surged across battle scarred no-man’s land and greeted each other, shaking hands warmly and wishing each other Merry Christmas in their own native tongue. They buried their dead and shared cigarettes, chocolates, bottles of wine and food.
In the spirit of Christmas Good Cheer, they posed for photographs together and looked at pictures of their loved ones at home. While they spoke different languages, the sentiments expressed were universal – of love, friendship and humanity- which are the same in all languages and need no words to understand.
As they “Built a Soldier’s truce, along the front line”, in the words of the Celtic Thunder song.
Many of the soldiers were mere boys, less than twenty years old, fighting in an alien land for King and country, in a senseless war that they did not understand. In subhuman conditions of mud and slush and rotting bodies. The killing was on a scale never witnessed before in human history and an entire generation was lost in the trenches, on either side. Their memory is preserved only in the neat rows of thousands of white headstones adorned by red poppies, flowering in the war cemeteries of Flanders, Ypres, Verdun, Somme and other killing fields of the Western Front.
As they lay in “some corner of a foreign field that would be forever England” as poet Rupert Brooke so poignantly said in his famous poem “Nineteen Fourteen: The Soldier.”
In 2014, a hundred years after that time, chocolate maker Sainsbury’s created an advertisement for their chocolates based on that incredible Christmas Truce and the true stories around it. Made with sensitivity and an eye for detail and authenticity, the advertisement shows the momentary surprise of British soldiers in their trenches as Christmas Carols come riding on the wind from the German side at night, as they willingly join in with the chorus in their own language.
This is followed by two soldiers, one British and one German, climbing out of their trenches disregarding the warnings of their mates, terror and tension writ large on their faces as they walk uncertainly across to the other side, their hands up in the air. The tension eases only when they are sure that the other side realises that they come in peace.
They shake hands, introducing themselves to each other, simply as Jim and Otto. By then hundreds of soldiers from both sides have joined them and are mingling freely with each other. Some of them throw down their greatcoats on the ground in the time-honoured manner, to mark goalposts and engage in a game of light-hearted football, in war torn no -man’s land.
Note: Wing Commander Arijit Ghosh is a military historian and a veteran Wing Commander of the Indian Air Force, who has served in the IAF for twenty-five years.
When the call comes to return to battle, they wish each other well and reluctantly turn back towards their respective trenches as the fighting resumes. No one ever wants a war, but it has been thrust upon us, many times in the history of mankind. Back in his trench, Otto realises that Jim has put a bar of Sainsbury’s chocolate given to him by a loved one, in his greatcoat pocket and the advert ends with a message celebrating the Christmas spirit of sharing. The unspoken feeling in his wistful smile is that if these two young men were to survive the War, they could easily become the best of friends.
This moving story is a wonderful affirmation that even in the darkest of times, in the heat of war in the most dreadful of situations, there can be great humanity and grace shining through, in ordinary folk. And that is a message that the world needs today more than ever before, in these fractured, divisive times.
For it holds a great promise for mankind when two nations locked in deadly, mortal kombat, can on Christmas Day, lay aside their arms and share smokes, play a game and wish each other happiness.
More than a hundred years on, the incredible graciousness and magnanimity of that moving event, continues to tug at heartstrings and raise goose pimples. And although the advert was made to honour the amazing Christmas Truce and the people engaged in that War, it also honours and commemorates the sacrifices of anyone who has ever served their country and donned a uniform, anywhere in the world.
While carrying at the same time, a wonderful message of the Christmas and New Year Spirit that is relevant and cherished, even today.
