Christmas Truce: The Western Front December 1914

by Malcolm Brown, Shirley Seaton

During Christmas 1914, in a war already famous for its horror and brutality, enemy shook hands with enemy in No Man's Land, exchanged souvenirs, even played football. The truce between the trenches extended over at least two-thirds of the British line and there were similar cease-fires in the French and Belgian sectors. In some areas the peaceable mood lingered well into 1915. Originally published in 1984, this book is one of the finest accounts ever assembled on one of the most overlooked stories of World War I.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, War, World War I, Historical, Christmas, Germany

327 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1984

About the author

Malcolm Brown is a best-selling popular military historian. Originally a television producer specialising in military documentaries, he has been a freelance historian at the Imperial War Museum since 1989. Brown has researched and written extensively on the First and Second World Wars. He is a regular contributor to BBC History Magazine, and lives in Reading.

Reviews

[Boudewijn]

Notes:

March 29, 2020: Added to TBR after reading De meeste mensen deugen where it was used as a resource

[Nikki · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoroughly researched book and very interesting. If you are researching WW1, this is a great book to understand how life was for a soldier in the trenches.

There are a lot of excerpts from letters sent home, diaries, and statements to high command. I found they were repetitive but it highlighted how similar incidents were all over the trenches. The authors also included German and French soldiers experiences. Which concluded as any reader would already know, that all soldiers, on all sides missed their home & loved ones, didn't really want to fight, & suffered greatly.

[James Steele · Rating 4 out of 5]

December of 1914 was the first winter of the Great War. It was also the year when all up and down the western front, acting independently of each other or commanders, battalions of British, French, German, and even Indian troops declared an informal truce on Christmas.

Technology in warfare had advanced to the point where neither side could advance without taking heavy losses, so 1914 saw the front lines becoming entrenched. Unable to move, soldiers had to stay put for months at a time, often with the enemy's lines less than 200 feet away.

Being so close to the enemy for such long stretches of time meant the soldiers of both sides became familiar with one another in a distant sense. Soldiers could hear one another conversing, shouting, screaming. They could see the other side was dealing with trench mud, cold, terrible rations, just the same as they themselves were. Being stuck with one another, dealing with the same conditions, and unable to escape one another produced a mutual sense of empathy.

After months of brutal but otherwise fruitless fighting, soldiers on the German side began doing something bizarre on Christmas Eve up and down the Western Front that crossed Belgium and France: they began putting up Christmas trees and lighting them, and then they began singing carols. Although not all British and French troops were so tolerant of such behavior (a few regiments did shoot the trees), a great many simply enjoyed the harmless spectacle. On Christmas Eve, the Germans sang a carol, and then the British answered with a song of their own, performances earning applause from both sides. It became a sport of sorts, exchanging carols instead of bullets.

The mood became so lighthearted that troops began popping their heads above the trenches, and they were not fired upon. All along the front line, the two sides sent people to meet halfway in No Man's Land and talk of a temporary ceasefire to bury the dead that lay around the battlefield. Thus up and down the line men emerged from their frozen trenches, walked into the void, and began burying the dead. With that grim business done, the two sides met. They talked. They bartered food, souvenirs, unique pieces of each other's uniform. Those who could speak across the language barrier exchanged news and helped translate for others.

But it wasn't over. Christmas Day 1914 remained quiet. Though the sequence of events varied along the front, both sides continued the ceasefire on the 25th in the spirit of the season. Soldiers on both sides enjoyed the respite from the violence, caroling continued, and once again soldiers met on the battlefield, shared meals, smoked together, conversed when they could, exchanged trinkets and photos.

Some parts of the front did not enjoy a truce (the French were far less willing to fraternize with the enemy, though both sides still honored the season by refraining from hostility on Christmas), but it happened in more places than not. They sang songs together, they took photos, they complained about the war. It was a very different attitude at the time: war was thought of as a sport between nations, not a battle of ideals, so there was no harm in ceasing gunfire for a few days. The truce allowed soldiers to meet the enemy, and many discovered the propaganda they had been fed was simply not true. Many of the Germans on the front had lived in Britain before they had been recalled to Germany for war, and they had no real hatred for the British. One British soldier recorded his astonishment hearing a German soldier speaking English in a London accent.

The authors present the story of Christmas through quotes and excerpts from letters, diaries, newspapers, and official communique from the time period, which means it does not flow as a story, but fragments of disconnected information. Despite this, the descriptions of a contest of caroling replacing the exchange of gunfire warmed my heart and made me giggle with glee. I could imagine myself on either side of the front line, tired and scared and exhausted after months of slogging through mud and keeping my head below the ground for fear of a bullet hitting me between the eyes, suddenly given a chance to walk freely, to laugh and sing again--and why not with the enemy? War is pointless, we can't move, we're all in the same muck together, so why the hell not meet the enemy and laugh about our situation?

Most surprising, especially to the British at the time, who had been bombarded with anti-German propaganda portraying them as savage "Huns" with no honor out to conquer helpless peoples, was that the Germans were almost always the first ones to decorate their trenches for Christmas and propose a ceasefire. This must truly have been a magical moment to realize the enemy was, in fact, human. (Though racial identity also played a huge factor at the time. The British considered the friendly Germans Saxons, nearly cousins to themselves, while the enemy "Huns" were the Prussians.)

Some parts of the front enjoyed a semi-truce beyond the new year. Many soldiers on both sides did not want to resume fighting. The authors relate an amusing story on one part of the Western Front shortly before the year ended that told of the German soldiers warning their British opponents that the General was visiting the front line, and they had to look like they were still at war, so they advised the British to keep their heads down until he had gone. Even the savage enemy says "crap, the boss is here! Everyone look busy!"

Sadly, the truce could not last. Middle command often approved the ceasefires and welcomed the break from the fighting, and at first so did high command. Inevitably the brass decided hostility must resume, and informal ceasefires could not happen again.

While the truce wasn't universal along the front, and it didn't last as long in some areas compared to others, that it happened at all is no miracle. The war had only just begun, and soldiers assumed it would last a few months and then everything would go back to normal. That had been the pattern of war in Europe for centuries prior, and nobody had reason to suspect 1914 would be any different. As the war dragged on and became more brutal (poison gas, air attacks, submarine attacks), ceasefires would not happen again on such a grand scale. War seemed less like a sport, and being in such close proximity to the enemy did not engender empathy for his situation. It only stirred resentment for all the enemy had inflicted on one's fellow soldiers.

Still, for many soldiers who survived the war, that Christmas would be the most memorable of their lives. A moment when Christmas sentiments actually meant something.

[Steven H · Rating 5 out of 5]

A DETAILED AND VERY INFORMATIVE SUMMARY OF THE FAMED ‘TRUCE’ IN 1914

Authors Malcolm and Shirley Seaton wrote in their 1994 Foreword to the revised and expanded version of the original 1984 book, “New material continues to come to light, offering an extra touch or so to the story… the episode the book celebrates, far from fading from view as a (kind of) benign but largely irrelevant blip in brutal and inhuman conflict, has attracted increasing public interest as time has gone by and can genuinely be seen as a precursor… of the spirit of reconciliation now powerfully abroad as one century ends and a new age begins… Of course, there have been terrible exceptions… But some things have changed and for the better, and the 1914 truce may perhaps claim a small place in that change.”

They state in the Preface, “The Christmas Truce really happened. It is as much a part of the historical texture of the First World War as the gas clouds of Ypres … or the Armistice of 1918. Yet it has often been dismissed as though it were merely a myth, a wartime yarn … [Or] it has been a minor incident blown up out of all proportion, natural fodder for the sentimentalists and pacifists of later generations. Veterans of the Western Front have been among the profoundest sceptics…” (Pg. xxi) They continue, “the Christmas truce is no legend… One thing must be said at the outset, however. This was not a unique occurrence in the history of war. Though it surprised people at the time… it was a resurgence of a long-established tradition… Granted that the Christmas truce actually happened, there are certain misapprehensions regarding it which perhaps call for immediate comment. One widely held assumption is that only the ordinary soldiers took part in it… Some of the best contemporary accounts occur in letters written by subalterns, captians, majors, even officers commanding who … recorded the event in as enthusiastic terms as their non-commissioned fellows…” (Pg. xxi-xxiii)

They go on, “Of course, in certain instances worried officers at the front DID intervene to put an peremptory end to the spontaneous camaraderie of their subordinates. In other cases, the officers left the fraternizing to their men… people looking for any quasi-Marxist division by rank or class between those who took part and those who did not will not find a particular satisfaction in this tale. The truth [is]… officers and men of both sides mingling freely, in a mixture of attitudes from cautious acceptance to delighted, even emotional participation, the difference in nationality and rank for one moment all but forgotten. One other misapprehension … calls for rebuttal… a belief … that the Christmas truce was considered … so disgraceful an event … that all knowledge of it was withheld from the public at home… True, the story was soon superseded by more somber reports… but it was by no means … dead… Contemporary histories of the war included it as a matter of course.” (Pg. xxiii-xxiv)

They note, “The war would not be over by Christmas as many people had hoped and expected, but there would be a Christmas peace of a kind, even though the slaughter would resume thereafter with an increased intensity and bitterness which would effectively guarantee that nothing on the same scale would ever happen again.” (Pg. 11)

They recount, “in the trenches… things were not as they had been. The spirit of Christmas was in the air and it was a most powerful and pervasive force. Added to the other elements already present---the proximity, the sharing of extreme conditions, and growing tendency towards a ‘live and let live’ mentality, the eagerness of families, friends and even authorities that the soldiers should share the pleasures of the season---that spirit became irresistible.” (Pg. 49)

They report, “Vigilant or not… they were not going to be deprived of their Christmas celebrations… they put their trees on the parapet and lit the candles. As they did so hundreds of their comrades were doing exactly the same… as far as the eye could see lighted Christmas trees were appearing to right and left along the whole sector… [British] were watching in fascinated amazement as the lighted Christmas trees… appeared on the German parapets… As striking as the sight presented by the German trenches was the sound coming from them, the distant, haunting sound of men singing, harmoniously and with deep emotion, the Christmas hymns which they had known since childhood… ‘Silent Night’ … stands out as being the most particularly and affectionately remembered by the listening Tommies, so much so that many of them could never hear that hymn in later life without being instantly transported back to the Western front, Christmas Eve 1914… In most cases, the British responded … with calls for more, and songs and carols of their own.” (Pg. 56-57)

They observe, “There is no doubt that many men who took part realized that they were doing something quite unusual and that they were sharing in an experience which they would only be able to describe in superlative terms… Men were frequently struck by the sheer incongruity of what they were doing… Indeed, the animosities which propagandists and politicians had sought to instill in their soldiers seem to have suddenly faded away---if only for the time being… It would be wrong to imply that the crimes of which the German armies stood accused were entirely forgotten, but the blame was usually fixed elsewhere; in particular the Saxons were assumed to have had no hand in the excesses blamed either on the Prussian soldiers or on the German leadership. Indeed, propaganda had far outstripped reality and when enemies met face to face they found that they were not only human but also, on the whole, likeable.” (Pg. 92-94)

They point out, ‘Evidence assembled from many sources suggests that the Christmas truce held---to a greater or lesser extent---over more than two-thirds of the British-held sector; but elsewhere Christmas came and went leaving little trace.” (Pg. 103)

They recount, “There was much taking of photographs on Christmas Day1914, enemy photographing enemy, enemy standing cheerfully side by side with the enemy as the cameras clicked… There was indeed a general regulation against the taking of photographs by soldiers on active service, and a crackdown on cameras began soon after Christmas 1914.” (Pg. 132)

They clarify, “To many people it has come to be accepted that the general feature of the Christmas truce of 1914 was a game… of football on which British and Germans took part… It is, of course, an attractive idea, carrying … the appealing if politically naïve implication that nations would be far better employed in settling their differences on the fields of sport rather than on the field of war… there is no question that football was discussed between British and Germans and the idea of playing a game was seriously canvassed.” (Pg. 134-135) They add, “if, given all this, a football game HAD suddenly appeared in No Man’s Land, arguably the most likely outcome would not be a formal game … but a disorganized, untidy affair with everybody joining in as much or as little as they wanted to.” (Pg. 138)

But ultimately, “The bracing weather which had provided so appropriate a setting for the events of Christmas now began to change. A sprinkling of snow had fallen on Boxing Day itself but… by the morning of the 27th the front was back in the grip of the usual… soaking rain… So the weather was back to ‘business as usual’ and so too in many areas was the war.” (Pg. 156-157)

They note, “Astonishingly, post-Christmas goodwill lingered on in one area for at least several weeks more… Having lasted so long, the peaceable mood was scarcely likely to change greatly before Easter, which came early that year… It can reasonably now be claimed that the Christmas truce lasted in places ALMOST to Easter, but there is also little doubt that BY Easter it was over and done with.” (Pg. 186-187)

They summarize, “the truce of Christmas 1914 cannot be dismissed as an event of no importance. It halted however briefly the juggernaut of war, gave some men an insight they were never to forget, made some men think twice about the nationally imposed animosities to which they were expected to subscribe… the insights inspired by the Christmas truce could… make even dedicated professional soldiers see, if only briefly, the whole idea of war in a new light---or at any rate glimpse the thought that war might not be as natural to an intelligent species as had always been assumed.” (Pg. 193-194)

They conclude, “The Christmas truce of 1914… was soon left behind by the march of events. As the numbers drawn to the Western Front grew larger and humanity seemed lost in longer and greater battles and new and ever more formidable technology, so the idea of shaking hands, joking and exchanging souvenirs with the enemy in No Man’s Land appeared increasingly remote and unreal, until even those who had taken part could find it difficult to accept that such events had actually occurred.” (Pg. 207)

They add, “In view of the events that followed, it would be easy to dismiss the events of that far-off Christmas as little more than a candle in the darkness. Yet they offer a light where no light might have been, and are thus a source of encouragement and hope that should not be overlooked and forgotten, rather acknowledged and, indeed, celebrated.” (Pg. 215-216)

This book will be “must reading” for anyone studying the Christmas Truce.

[Judith Johnson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although there are touching testaments of temporary truce in this book, which catalogues, no doubt, all the accounts which the authors could find, it is somewhat repetitive and I'm therefore not going on beyond page 92.

Why should there be any surprise that, given the opportunity, men should temporarily cease to kill each other - allowing the knowledge that they have a common humanity to surface? As Harry Patch memorably said, "War is murder, nothing else", and so much of war serves the ambitions of the mighty to hang on to their power and property. I have visited war cemeteries - French, German, British, American, Indian - and seen the graves of Chinese workers who were brought in to clear up the remains of the dead at the end of the First World War. All of them were deeply grieved by their loved ones.

Here's what Wilfred Owen had to say, and he was there...

Dulce et Decorum Est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.

Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime.—
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

[Matti Karjalainen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Malcolm Johnston Brownin ja Shirley Seatonin "Christmas Truce: The Western Front December 1914" (Macmillan, 2014) kuvaa englantilaisten ja saksalaisten ensimmäisen maailmansodan länsirintamalla solmimaa epävirallista aselepoa, joka eräillä rintamalohkoilla keskeytti sotatoimet joulunpyhiksi tai huomattavasti pitemmäksikin aikaa.

Vuonna 1984 ensimmäisen kerran ilmestynyt tietokirja on kaiken kaikkiaan kiinnostavaa luettavaa ja valottaa erinomaisesti ensimmäistä joulua länsirintaman juoksuhaudoissa. Saksalaiset vaikuttavat olleen useammin aloitteellisia osapuolia jouluna tapahtuneessa veljeilyssä. Sodankäynnin tauottua sotilaat nousivat juoksuhaudoistaan ja tapasivat toisiaan ei-kenenkään maalla. Joululauluja laulettiin, elintarvikkeita ja tupakkaa vaihdettiin toisiinsa. Paikoitellen annettiin ymmärtää, ettei toinen osapuoli tule ampumaan, mikäli toinenkaan ei sitä tee.

Englantilaiset tutkijat kuitenkin kyseenalaistavat sen, pelattiinko ei-kenenkään maalla koskaan jalkapallo-ottelua saksalaisten ja englantilaisten välillä: luultavasti palloa potkittiin, mutta ei todennäköisesti siinä mittakaavassa kuin yleinen näkemys antaisi ymmärtää.

Ranskalaiset ja belgialaiset joukot eivät juurikaan ryhtyneet veljeilemään saksalaisten maahantunkeutujien kanssa, mutta englantilaiset olivat myös hyvin tietoisia siitä, ettei aselepo tule pitämään. Joulurauhaa pidettiin enemmän eräänlaisena lyhyenä paussina, vähän niin kuin erätaukona nyrkkeilyottelussa. Korkeamman sodanjohdon kanta oli muutenkin kielteinen, ja jatkossa veljeily tultiin kieltämään erityisellä käskyllä.

Lähteinä on käytetty niin joukko-osastojen virallisia asiakirjoja kuin tavallisten rintamasotilaiden käymää kirjeenvaihtoa. Englantilaiset ja saksalaiset pääsevät molemmat ääneen, tosin ensiksimainitut ovat paremmin edustettuina. Sotilaiden kertomat tarinat ovat välillä hyvin koskettavia.

Suosittelisin "Christmas Trucea" jokaiselle ensimmäisestä maailmansodasta kiinnostuneille historian ystävälle.

[Robert Hepple · Rating 4 out of 5]

First published in 1984, and then significantly revised and expanded in 1994, 'Christmas Truce' tells the story of the Christmas truce of December 1914 on the western front during the Great War. The narrative is supported by numerous accounts, some from around the time of the events and others taken at a much later date from surviving veterans. The accounts include both first hand accounts and hearsay, with some attempt to corroborate the two. This is seemingly due to occasional claims over the years that the whole thing is a myth, and attempts to evidence the claim that the truce did happen on numerous points of the British lines as well as a smaller number of points on the Belgian and French lines. Evidence is further supplied for the duration of the truce, together with details of les successful truce held at Christmas 1915. Some illustrations are supplied, some of which feature contributing veterans taking part in the 1914 truce. Quite a brilliant and poignant read about an event which, whilst it had (arguably) little or no effect on the outcome of the Great War, continues to be remembered for the human touch that it added to an inhumane conflict.

[Bill38silver · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the few books that I have rated 5. It is an enthralling account about an extraordinary event when a short period of sanity and humanity took control in many places in the trenches at Christmas 1914, far away from the politicians and senior military figures who dictated that millions of men were led to the slaughter in the first cataclysmic world war.

Whilst there is repetition of particular episodes the fact that records tally from both sides of the enemy forces reinforces the truth of the truce and what happened to ordinary people in the midst of hate and war. If left to the men at the front line many would have downed weapons and gladly gone home in peace but somebody in authority would have had to reverse the events leading up to the outbreak and early months of the war.

This is a stunning read, brilliantly assembled and then and now a glimmer of hope in a desperate world.

[Mdaly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book, thoroughly researched, about the Christmas Truce that broke out along the Western Front in December 1914.
Originally published in 1984, the authors were able to get testimony from WWI survivors who had taken part and witnessed the events.
It benefits greatly from having a wide range of British, French and German sources.
A must read for all readers interested in the First World War.

[Beth · Rating 4 out of 5]

I rated this 4 because it is written in such detail and in academic language (or maybe it's military language?) that I'm concerned that the truth of this pause for peace will not be read by future generations. The fact that the truce went up and down the Western Front, that it lasted into New Year's Day, that the commanding officers had to remind the men they were to hate...This is definitely a story to be told and told again, but this may not be the right book for you.

[Greg]

A straightforward historical account of the 1914 Christmas truce on the Western front of The Great War. Lots of excerpts from soldiers' letters and military records.

[Jensen · Rating 3 out of 5]

A bit repetitive in places.

Nonetheless, the willingness of soldiers to have compassion for the opposing side illustrates the futility of war then and now.

[Charlie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very enjoyable reading in such detail about so a small but profoundly powerful event.

[Janet · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not a new book - it was first published in 1984 - but still a fascinating account of the truce between warring forces along the Western Front at Christmas 1914.

Not just one insignificant event, ceasefires occurred spontaneously at many points along the Front, often instigated by German troops for whom Christmas was a very important celebration. Most of the fraternization took place between German and British troops, less so between French and German, as there was a more difficult underlying history there. It seems too that the Saxon soldiers, many of whom had lived and worked in Britain, were more inclined to friendliness than their Prussian compatriots.

Although some COs were bitterly opposed to any fraternization, others seem to have welcomed the break from hostilities, taking the chance to bury their war dead and in some cases to observe the enemy defences and manpower. In many places, carols were sung, and gifts exchanged between soldiers on opposite sides, and there was much humorous banter shared. Even where direct fraternization didn't take place, the ceasefire allowed for a peaceful night.

The truce was widely reported in the newspapers at the time, many soldiers writing home to their relatives, sometimes hardly able to believe themselves what had taken place, but many acknowledging that it was an experience they would not have missed.

The book is well illustrated with photographs and contains many extracts from war diaries, letters and personal accounts, with appendices of documents from Army War Diaries and lists of brigades involved in the truce on both sides.

"In view of the horrors which have followed, it would be easy to dismiss the events ofthat far-off Christmas as little more than a candle in the darkness. Yet they offer a light where no light might have been, and are thus a source of encouragement and hope that should not be overlooked and forgotten, rather acknowledged and, indeed, celebrated."

[Trawets · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Christmas Truce on the Western Front in 1914, is the stuff of myths and legend, Malcolm Brown and Shirley Seaton examine the myths and give a fascinating account of the 1914 truce.
It appears that informal truces were fairly commonplace around Christmas 1914 especially between British and Indian troops and their German opponents. The Germans were almost universally the istigators and took a considerable risk in coming out of their trenches unarmed, many spoke Enlish having worked in England before the war and were able to interpret for their comrades. Presents and good wishes were exchanged, songs were sung and photos taken, on a more serious level the dead were buried and trenches made more habitable, the fabled games of football in no-man's-land seem to have been just that, a fable, the ground was unsuitable being full of shell holes and front line trenches were not the sort of place to have a supply of footballs.
The halt in hostilities, mostly very short-lived lasted quite a while in some places, where there was no serious fighting until almost Easter 1915, but attempts by German troops to fratenize at Christmas 1915 were quickly rebuffed. Christmas 1914 remained a unique and for many who were there their most memorable Christmas.

[Mike Edwards · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting account of the famous 1914 christmas truce on the western front. Enlivened by letters from some of those taking part, the truce was more than a christmas day halt to the fighting, extending for weeks in some places of the line. The ad-hoc nature of the cease fires is shown through the personal initiative of some of those on both sides showing that even in the darkest times humanity can shine through.

[themadblonde · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well researched (this is an updated third edition of sorts), well written, clearly outlined, good resources, easy to read account of . I've really enjoyed finding out details (well documented) about my favourite historical incident, the 1914 (WWI) Christmas Truce. This is probably the only history book that ever made me cry (w/ anything other than boredom &/or frustration).

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a wonderful story and a fascinating footnote in history, however, it could have easily and more appropriately been told in 100 pages or less. The length of the book (> 200 pages) diluted an otherwise interesting historical event that highlighted the goodness in humanity during a time of darkness and war.

[Shaun Major · Rating 4 out of 5]

An older telling of this amazing story, and, as well written and researched as it is, it would be wonderful to see it brought up to date with all of the research and discoveries in the thirty years since. That said it is a remarkably well told version of the first christmas of the Great War and you can see the wonder on the faces of the men of 1914.

[Alice · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's not often a non-fiction book makes me sob or squeal with joy out loud, but this thorough account of Christmas 1914 on the Western Front did both. A great deal of detail on exactly what happened, who was involved, and the later consequences, busting some myths and confirming others. Was there really football? There was.

[Tim Corke · Rating 1 out of 5]

I started this book expecting to enjoy this detailed description of the Christmas Truce but unfortunately it was bit too detailed for me. Had to leave it 1/4 way through! Possibly the first wartime/military book I've not been able to finish. Perhaps another day,

[Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Truly startling accounts revealing humanity on a scale, the likes of which, are unlikely to be ever witnessed again