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| Saturday, May 16, 12:14:53pm | [ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, [7], 8, 9, 10 ] |
| Subject: Re: Joyeux Noël | |
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Author: LISA (PEACE) |
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Date Posted: Tuesday, December 25, 10:11:43am In reply to: davy boy 's message, "Re: Joyeux Noël" on Tuesday, December 25, 04:35:47am Many myths and legends surround World War One and Christmas - especially the first Christmas of the war in December 1914. The British public and the soldiers fighting in the mud of Flanders were given the impression by those in charge that the Germans, fighting possibly less than100 metres away, were blood-lusting psychopaths bent on destroying all in their way. Any form of friendship between the two sides fighting the war, would have been seen as detrimental to this impression. While the Germans remained the "evil Hun", the government and the military could justify their respective tactics. However, the first Christmas of 1914 clearly broke the impression that those in charge wanted to portray. For many years - even after the war - the government wanted to maintain the image of the dastardly Hun and any references to any fraternisation between both sides was clamped down on. There were whispers here and there but no actual evidence. The same happened with the football match between the British and the Germans. The image that the German soldiers were just like the British and the French would not have worked for the Allies. But recent research by Stanley Weintraub has proved that there was fraternisation - improvised at the time in December 1914 but with some ‘rules’ quickly built in. Weintraub has found that the first smatterings that something was not quite right took place in the trenches where the Berkshire Regiment faced the XIX Corps of the German Army. The XIX’s were from Saxony. The Saxons started to put up small conifers on the parapets of their trenches - akin to our Christmas trees. The Berkshires could see many of them lining the tops of the XIX’s trenches. Groups of the Berkshires and the Saxons met in No-Mans Land and officers from both sides turned a blind eye to this fraternisation which broke military law. In fact, the officers in these trenches agreed to an informal truce between Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Governments and politicians make war, not every person is a blood thirsty animal, whatever nationality. Governments incite such hatred in such times to ensure men fight. Governments and politicians change attitudes. How quick they are at war end to re-build and tell us to be friends. In civil war this could have been brother against brother as opposed to Saxon v Anglo-Saxon. Attitudes must remain humane and not be twisted by power. Otherwise we learn nothing from History, nothing from mistakes and it will happen again. Hopefully not for our children. Ceasefire for this Christmas ? They saw through it in 1917. POWERS THAT BE MADE IT CONTUINUE. Merry Christmas. [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] |
| Subject | Author | Date |
| Re: Joyeux Noël | LISA (ODE TO JOY) | Tuesday, December 25, 11:46:11pm |
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