The story behind 1914 Christmas truce credit _ Sainsbury's ad
Rifleman Mallard (machine gun section in the Rifle Brigade):
About 4.30 on Christmas Eve we heard music, and gathered that the Germans had a band in their trenches, but our artillery spoilt the effect by dropping a couple shells right in the centre of them, and you can guess what became of the band, for we heard it no more. We were wondering if the Germans would agree to a couple days' truce, and soon as it was dark we were surprised to see Christmas trees stuck the top of their trenches lighted up with candles, and men sitting on the trench. We got out our trench and exchanged a few cigarettes with the Germans, and invited them to come over and have a drink and smoke, but we did not like to trust each other first. After a while, however, three of our officers started to go over and meet German officers who were approaching them, their way being directed by a searchlight in the German lines. It made a fine picture to see those six officers meet between the two lines, shake hands, and smoke each other's cigarettes. The glow of the searchlight, and all the boys gave a tremendous cheer and became quite excited over it. After a while our officers returned, bringing with them souvenirs of the Germans."
#merrychristmas
#christmastree #christmastruce #ww1 #wwi #armisticeday100 #greatwareducation #greatwar #wwii #love #peace #christmastree #brotherhood #europeanhistory #worldwaronehistory
Dead horse blown up in the tree , WW1
Translated
WWI, 1915; "Pegasus had wings - What we see in War. This unfortunate horse was blown into a tree after a shell exploded." -Le Flambeau/Gallica
Amazing video of Christmas at front 1914-1918
Source - British Pathe
A very amazing and rare video of : Battle of the Somme: scenes from railway carriage (1916)
#ww1
#somme
World's first Tank color footage.
Edited - Nguyen Truong Long
Rare WW1 footage from Battle of Verdun ( 1916).
Source - British pathe.