| nix001 | Friday, December 26, 2008 - 12:49 am 
For me it's still Christmas day. 11:51pm
Did'nt my Queen do well. 
I hope you all have had a good day. If not then remember your not the only one.
Anyway.
GOOGLED: Christmas football WW1
Legend has it that on Christmas Day 1915, soldiers from both sides of the trenches in World War One met up in No Mans Land for a game of football. Nothing official was kept of this brief meeting on Christmas Day between the enemy, so our knowledge of what took place has always been somewhat patchy. However, the death in 2001 of one of the men who took part in this match resurrected memories of the occasion.
Bertie Felstead, the last survivor of that football match, died in July 2001 aged 106 years.
Bertie Felstead, remembered the following:
He was a member of the Royal Welch Fusiliers.
On Christmas Eve, he was stationed in northern France with his colleagues near the village of Laventie when he heard the Germans in a trench 100 metres away singing Silent Night. In reply, the Royal Welch Fusiliers sang Good King Wenceslas.
On Christmas Day, after some shouting between both trenches, he and his colleagues got out of their icy trench and greeted the Germans. Bertie Felstead recalled that the Germans probably were already out of their trench before the British got out. He claimed that nothing was planned and that what happened was entirely spontaneous.
A football was produced from somewhere, though he could not re-call from where.
"It was not a game as such more of a kick-around and a free-for-all. There could have been 50 on each side for all I know. I played because I really liked football. I don't know how long it lasted, probably half-an-hour, and no-one was keeping score."
The truce ended when a British major ordered the British soldiers back to their trench with a reminder that "they were there to kill the Hun not to make friends with him." The mood of Christmas friendliness was shortly broken by the firing of British artillery. Bertie Felstead described the Germans as "all right". |
| nix001 | Friday, December 26, 2008 - 12:58 am
Regardless of how much we hurt, we should never blow on the candle flame of peace. |
| Alexander Platypus (Little Upsilon) | Friday, December 26, 2008 - 01:32 am
yeah i heard about that stuff during ww1. it really does sort of make the entire war seem silly pointless and crazy |
| nix001 | Friday, December 26, 2008 - 01:43 am
Depends which side you were on. |
| Stuart Taylor (Little Upsilon) | Friday, December 26, 2008 - 01:45 am
nix, its not a legend - it actually happenend. My grandfather (mothers side) was there and I remember him telling me about it as a child, although the details are a bit sketchy now (it was almost 25 years ago), I remember being told that the Germans threw the football into 'no mans land' and offered a game.....
How the game came to an end differed in my grandfathers story though. In his story, both British and German officers spoke and decided that it was bad for morale for each side, as these guys would be killing each other the next day. Both teams were then ordered to return to there trenches by their respective CO's. |
| FarmerBob | Friday, December 26, 2008 - 02:29 pm
Every war is a political blunder and therefore pointless and crazy. Unfortunately, we will always have politicians and, consequently, war. |
