World War I (1914 - 1918) was the most fierce battle and the largest scale in human history with 19 million dead, second only to World War II. November every year, people celebrate the end of World War and the pain of war, and in December, people remember a historic Christmas event during World War
World War I ended without a nation actually winning, all with heavy losses of life and property. After the war, Europe was in crisis.
BACKGROUND
World War I broke out in 1914 when the Germans opened the western front to capture Luxembourg, Belgium, and then to attack the major industrial cities of France.
By September 1914, the British and French forces stopped the Germans in the Marne River outside Paris, and the Germans were forced to retreat and consolidate their defenses.
World War I. (Photo via History on the Net)
The Anglo-French-Belgian coalition attacked the German front lines, the battle was fierce on every inch of land, the two sides dug solid trenches to consolidate their positions. The trenches of the two sides stretched from the North Sea to the French-Belgian-Swiss border.
On December 7, 1414, the Pope and some neutral countries tried to call on the ceasefire parties to cease fire at Christmas: "Silence the gunfire so that the angels may sing that night," but were repel.
Near Christmas Day, 101 British women sent Christmas cards to Germany and Austria with a message of peace.
The two sides battle line
At Christmas, fewer weapons and ammunition are delivered to the battlefield; Instead, presents, Christmas cards, food and drinks arrived.
At the trenches in Ypres, Saint-Yvon (Belgium) where the battle between the British and the Germans took place. Right before Christmas 1914, German soldiers decorated Christmas beautifully on their trenches. German soldiers light candles in trenches and hang them on Christmas trees.
German and British soldiers met in a truce, published in The Illustrated London News, January 9, 1915. (Photo from wikipedia.org)
On their trenches, the British soldiers who saw the glowing German trench were very alert as if the Germans were about to attack. Then they heard a sound: "Stille Natch! Heilige Natch! ”Is the German song" Silent Night "(Silent Night). A British soldier shouted, "They are singing, we should sing along!", So on his trenches his soldiers also sang his Christmas song.
This is the most unforgettable moment of the soldiers, the hymns have replaced the fierce gunfire on the battlefield. They sang Christmas songs like they never had before.
The greetings and greetings of Christmas resound in the trenches of both sides. They went out of their trenches to the other's trenches to give each other food, cigarettes, wine and water; share mementos about family and lover. In that moment, the concept of "our army" and "enemy" no longer existed.
Elsewhere, on Christmas day, German soldiers called for a ceasefire. While the British officers had not responded, a British soldier recklessly stood up and stuck his head out. And so the soldiers on both sides came out of the trenches, ran to shake hands, and shared with each cigarette.
Beautiful memories
An English soldier wrote to his mother saying: “I write from the trenches. It is 11:00 am. Next to me is a charcoal fireplace, opposite to me is a wet shelter containing straw. The ground is slippery in trench traffic, the outside is icy. I'm holding a pipe. There was medicine in the pipe. Of course, she would say that. But do not rush. In the pipe were German cigarettes. Ha ha, I will say, is a prisoner or a child found in a captured trench. Oh no! It was a gift from a German soldier. Yes, a living German soldier came from his trenches. Yesterday the British and German soldiers met and shook hands on the battlefield between trenches, and exchanged mementos, and shook hands. Yes, all around Christmas, and as I wrote. Great!".
British and German soldiers meet in a truce, taken in 1914. (Image from wikipedia.org)
Captain Robert Patrick Miles of the Army's "King’s Shropshire" Infantry Regiment recounted in a letter published in the Daily Mail: "Friday we had an incredibly Christmas celebration. An unwarranted retirement was not allowed either, but both sides understood its value and wholeheartedly adhered to what happened between us and the friends on the front ... Everything began last night - a cold frosty night - just as it was getting dark the Germans told us, 'Hey, British, Merry Christmas'. Of course, we also shouted back in response, then many people from both sides left their trenches, abandoned their weapons, met on the battlefield between the two battle lines. A deal was established, will not shoot each other until midnight. The soldiers interacted in the neutral zone (we did not allow them to get too close to the line), exchanging cigarettes very friendly. That night there was no gunfire. ”
Along the front lines, the armistice spread everywhere. In Ypres (Belgium) British and German soldiers left the trenches to shake hands to celebrate Christmas, share photos and tell each other stories about their families. Suddenly a balloon flew up from the Germans, so the British and German soldiers rushed to the ball innocently like children. Immediately the soldiers of both sides made golf and then kicked the ball, the result of the most beautiful match in this soldier's life, the Germans won 3 - 2.
The Christmas match in 1914. (Photo from esquire.co.uk)
But this is not the only football match, according to the soldiers' generals, there are dozens of such matches along the front lines in this historic Christmas truce.
Immediately after Christmas, soldiers on both sides were ordered to stop a ceasefire, anyone who disobeyed orders would be severely punished, and the fierce battle began.
Tribute
Later, many articles, magazines and television republished the reminiscence of the soldiers participating in the truce, for them this is an unbelievably beautiful memory, a rare peaceful moment of peace. in the brutal fight.
On November 21, 2005, the last veteran of the historic Christmas truce in 1914, Alfred Anderson, died in Scotland at the age of 109.
Since 2011, the English Football Federation and the Premier League Organizing Committee have cooperated to launch the Christmas Truce Tournament, held annually in Ypres (Belgium), righteous. where the football match took place on Christmas Day 1914.
In parallel with the tournament are activities that show the fierce fierceness of war, from which humanity can see the pricelessness of peace.
Trần Hưng - TRI THỨC VIỆT NAM
Comments