WWI – “The war to end war”
German tenor Walter Kirchhoff had performed at London’s Covent Garden opera house in 1913, but he had never sung for a French audience.
That changed dramatically during the unofficial 1914 Christmas truce on the Western Front during World War I.
Soldiers on both sides had been separately singing Christmas carols and bawdy songs when Mr. Kirchhoff arrived in the trenches.
The musician had accompanied German Crown Prince Wilhelm on a Yuletide visit to the front.
There, his impromptu concert for the “field-grey boys” of the 130th Wuerttemberger Regiment drew plaudits not only from his fellow Germans but from enemy troops huddled 75 yards away.
“French soldiers on parapets opposite had applauded until [Mr. Kirchhoff] gave them an encore,” Stanley Weintraub wrote in “Silent Night,” his 2001 history of the unlikely halt in hostilities.
This year marks the 100th anniversary of that short lull during four years of increasingly vicious combat.
During a period of several days along a 300-mile front that divided Western Europe, men who had been seeking to kill each other for five bloody months refrained from dealing death. Contemporary reports say they exchanged small gifts, drank together, sang familiar songs and even played spirited soccer matches in the no-man’s land between their trenches.[…]
The sight of the lighted trees on the edge of the German trenches worried and then intrigued British, Belgian and French soldiers, who were often less than 100 yards away.
“The British crawled out to see,” Mr. Weintraub said. “Then the Germans crawled out. When they met, they had something to trade.”
Although top brass on both sides opposed any conciliatory gestures, enlisted men and many lower-level officers — lieutenants, captains and majors — welcomed the respite. The two sides reached an agreement to meet Christmas Day. The truce held in many places while burial parties retrieved and interred the remains of fallen comrades.
With no women around for many miles, many young men’s fancies turned to sports.
Shell holes were filled in and ersatz soccer balls were created from tied-up bundles of cloth. Although some German and British athletes just kicked their makeshift balls around in informal scrimmages, other soldiers picked national teams, played full matches and kept score.