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Dec. 30, 2021 - Radio Free Nortwest - H.A. Covington
02:07:35
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Oh, then tell me, Sean O 'Farrell, tell me why you hurry so.
Hush, a vocal, hush and listen, and his cheeks were all aglow.
I bear orders from the captain, get you ready quick and soon, for the pikes must be together by the rising of the moon.
By the rising of the moon, by the rising of the moon For the pikes must be together by the rising of the moon Oh, then tell me, Sean O'Farrell, where the gathering is to be In the old spot by the river, right well known to you and me One word more for singing
Thank you.
Greetings from the Northwest homeland, comrades.
The date is Thursday, December 30th, 2021.
I'm Jimmy, and this is Radio Free Northwest.
Radio Free Northwest This is Douglas Morrison, and you're listening to Radio Free Northwest.
I didn't want to do a show this month so we could all focus on family stuff for the Christmas holiday, but I've been very blessed, and I've been contacted by a gentleman who had the same thought as I did to revive Radio Free Northwest, and he stumbled across my recent broadcasts.
He prepared an end-of-the-year show, and I'm going to go ahead and put that out for you guys now as Jimmy and I start collaborating.
So, surprise!
Merry Christmas!
Enjoy, and we'll talk to you again in the new year.
So, right about now, you're probably wondering who I am, so here's a quick background.
I first learned about the Northwest Front only about a year before Mr. Covington passed away.
And during that time, I was just a silent listener.
It wasn't around about maybe a year after Mr. Covington's death that I first made contact with the HQ group.
When I first stumbled upon Radio Free Northwest, I was completely awestruck, because it was the first time in my life I was actually hearing someone speaking words that just resonated deep within me.
And now you might be wondering, what gives me the right to continue, especially using the name Radio Free Northwest, and why am I not calling this podcast something else?
And, well, the answer to that is really simple.
Mr. Covington gave any of us the right to use his works for the furtherance of the 14 words.
And I intend to honor the memory of Mr. Covington by retaining the traditions he built up over the decade that Radio Free Northwest was being produced.
And to that end, I'd like to speak directly to former RFN contributors now, in case any of them will hear this.
Gretchen the Librarian, Lord Lucan, The Trucker, Comrade Jason, The Count of Lettuce, AJ, Thank you so much for your years of contributions to both the Northwest Front and Radio Free Northwest.
If any of you would like to be a part of the next generation of RFN, it would be my honor and privilege to continue producing more RFN broadcasts with any content that you are willing to provide.
And this offer isn't just for former contributors.
Any of you listening, if you want to be involved with Radio Free Northwest, you'll be able to send me audio clips, just like you would send Harold, and I will try to produce new content using them.
And I'll provide some contact info at the end of the broadcast.
The HQ group used to refer to Pacific Northwest natives as woodchucks, so I guess that makes me a woodchuck.
I was born and raised here, and God willing, I'll die here.
But this does mean that there is one thing I can never do to show my commitment to the Butler Plan, and that's the positive affirmative act of coming home, which, as history has shown, is a very difficult thing to decide to do, but I will do my best to prove my commitment to all of you with these podcasts.
In RFN number 128, Harold said, We are 21st century white Americans, and we don't have the chops for this kind of thing.
Except for a very tiny, tiny minority of the white population, that is.
Maybe no more than 100,000 of us who still have that old alpha gene and are capable of taking life seriously.
But 100,000 men and women capable of true life commitment to their people would be more than enough if they can ever be informed that we are here.
And maybe there's only 10,000 of that kind of white man left, men that our great-grandfathers would have recognized and would have been glad to see calling on their daughters.
And that's enough as well, if we can ever locate that 10,000 and by some hook or crook let them know of the Butler plan.
And maybe there's only 1,000 of us left, and even that would be enough, if we can bring them here and organize them into active units and crews.
Now, I'll never be the great organizer that Harold dreamed of for the Butler plan, and frankly I'm not trying to be, but maybe, just maybe...
That organizer will be introduced to the Butler Plan because of these broadcasts.
I will continue the tradition of RFN being generally religion neutral, but I do want to provide one word of exhortation to our Christian listeners.
In James 4.17 it says, To him who knows what is right and does it not, to him it is counted as sin.
Now I don't have the written or oratory skills that Harold had, and I certainly don't have the steadfast determination that he had.
At least not yet.
But I know that the survival of our race is right, and I know firsthand the hope that RFN broadcasts can bring to someone living behind enemy lines without a single white nationalist contact.
Alright, so that's enough intro for this show.
It's the end of the year, and it seems appropriate to revive RFN with a special music show continuing Harold's End of Your Tradition.
So I've gone back through past RFN episodes and picked out a lot of my personal favorites.
And here's a clip of Harold to kick off the show.
On October 25, 1415, an army of about 9,000 Englishmen commanded by their king, Henry V, fought a battle with a much larger army of between 30,000 and 50,000 French at a place called Agincourt.
It's almost impossible to figure out an accurate estimate of how many men fought in any medieval battle, but everybody agrees the Brits were wildly outnumbered and everybody figured the armored French knights were going to crush them like a bug.
But because most of the English army consisted of skilled archers armed with heavy longbows, and because the dumbass French insisted on charging straight across a muddy field that turned into an impassable quagmire, where all those heavy-armored horses and men sank into the mire, the English won an upset victory over an army which, realistically outnumbered them at least four to one.
It was not only a brilliant military feat but it was probably the source of this immense superiority complex that the British seem to hang on to even today when their national heroes aren't Henry V or Francis Drake anymore but Benny Hill and Boyd George.
Anyway I'm going to begin by playing for you one of the most famous passages ever written by William Shakespeare, the St. Crispin's Day speech from the play Henry V. Where is the king?
The king himself is rode to view their battle.
A fighting man.
They have full threescore thousand.
That's five to one.
Besides, they are all fresh.
It is a fearful odds.
Oh, that we now had here.
But one ten thousand of those men in England that do no work today.
What's he that wishes so?
My cousin Westmoreland?
No, my fair cousin.
If we are marked to die, we are enough to do our country loss.
And if to live, the fewer men, the greater share of honor.
God's will, I pray thee, wish not one man more.
Rather, proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host, that he which hath no stomach to this fight, let him depart.
His passport shall be made and rounds for convoy put into his purse.
We would not die in that man's company that fears his fellowship to die with us.
This day is called the Feast of Crispian.
He that outlives this day and comes safe home will stand at tiptoe when this day is named and arouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall see this day and live old age will yearly, on the vigil, feast his neighbours and say, Tomorrow is St. Crispin's.
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars and say, These wounds I had on Crispin's day.
Old men forget, yet all shall be forgot, but he'll remember with advantages what feats he did that day.
Then shall our names, familiar in their mouths as household words, Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter, Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester, be in their flowing cups freshly remembered.
This story shall the good man teach his son.
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by.
From this day to the ending of the But we in it shall be remembered.
We few.
We happy few.
We band of brothers.
For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.
Be he ne 'er so vile, this day shall gentle his condition.
And gentlemen in England, now abed, shall think themselves accursed they were not here, and hold their manhoods cheap, whilst any speaks that thought with us.
Upon St. Crestman's Day!
My sovereign lord, bestow yourself with speed.
The French are bravely in their battle set and will, with all expedience, march upon us.
All things are ready if our minds be so.
Purish the man whose mind is backward now.
That does not wish more help from England, cuz.
God's will, my liege.
Would you and I alone, without my help, could fight this royal battle?
You know your places!
God be with you all!
Once more I come to know of the King Harry, if for thy ransom thou wilt now compound, before thy most assured overthrow.
Who hath sent thee now?
The Constable of France.
I pray thee, bear my former answer back.
Bid them achieve me, and then sell my bones.
God!
God!
Why should they mock poor fellows thus?
Let me speak proudly.
Tell the constable, we are but warriors for the working day.
Our gayness and our guilt are all besmirched with rainy marching in the painful field, but by the mass, our hearts are in the trim.
Herald!
Save thou thy labour.
Come thou no more for ransom, gentle herald.
They shall have none, I swear, but these my joints, which, if they have, as I shall leave them, shall yield them little.
Tell the constable.
I shall, King Harry.
And so fare thee well.
Thou never shalt hear herald anymore.
My lord, most humbly on my knee, I beg the leading of the Varwood.
Take it, brave York.
Now, soldiers, march away.
And how thou pleasest God.
Dispose the day.
Here was 1778.
How I wish I was in Sherbrooke now.
A letter of mark came from the king to the scummiest vessel I've ever seen.
God damn them all.
I was told we'd cruise the seas for American gold.
We'd fire no guns, shed no tears.
Now I'm a broken man on a Halifax pier, the last of Barrett's privateers.
Oh, well, Sid Barrett cried.
I wish I was in Sherbrooke now Or twenty brave men or fishermen Who would make for him The antelopes crew Goddamn them all I was told we'd cruise The seas for American gold We'd fire no guns Shed no tears Now I'm a broken man On a Halifax pier The last of Barrett's privateers The antelope sloop was a sickening sight.
How I wish I was in Sherbrooke now.
She'd a list to the port and her sails in rags and the cook in the scuppers with the staggers and jags.
God damn them all.
I was told we'd cruise the seas for American gold.
We'd fire no guns, shed no tears.
Now I'm a broken man on a Halifax pier.
The last of Barrett's privateers.
On the king's birthday we put to sea How I wish I was in Sherbrooke now We're 91 days to Montego Bay Pumping like madmen all the way God damn them all I was told we'd cruise the seas for American gold We'd fire no guns,
shed no tears Now I'm a broken man on a Halifax pier The last of Barrett's privateers On the 96th day we sailed again.
I wish I was in Sherbrooke now.
When a bloody great Yankee hove in sight with our cracked four-pounders we made to fight.
Goddamn them all.
I was told we'd cruise the seas for American gold.
We'd fire no guns, shed no tears.
Now I'm a broken man on the Halifax Pier.
The last of Barrett's brava tears.
The Yankee lay low down with gold.
I wish I was in Sherbrooke now.
She was broad and fat and loose in stays, but to catch her took the antelope two whole days.
Goddamn them all.
I was told we'd cruise the seas for American gold.
We'd fire no guns, shed no tears.
I'm a broken man on a halifax pier, the last of Barrett's prairie but tears.
And at length we stood two cables away, I wish I was in Sherbrooke now.
Our cracked four-pounders made an awful din, but with one fat ball he ain't stole the sin, God damn them.
I was told we'd cruise the seas for American gold.
We'd fire no guns, shed no tears.
Now I'm a broken man on a Halifax pier, the last of Barrett's brava tears.
The antelope shook and pitched on her side.
I wish I was in Sherbrooke now.
Barrett was smashed like a bowl of eggs, and the main truck carried off both men eggs.
God damn them all!
I was told we'd cruise the seas for American gold.
We'd fire no guns, shed no tears.
Now I'm a broken man on the Halifax Pier, the last of Barrett's privateers.
So here I lay in my 23rd year.
I wish I was in Sherbrooke now.
It's been six years since we sailed away and I just made Halifax yesterday.
Goddamn them, oh!
I was told we'd cruise the seas for American gold.
We'd fire no guns, shed no tears.
Now I'm a broken man on a Halifax pier.
The last of Barrett's variety.
Cheers.
you Thank you.
you Of all my female characters, it seems to be a three-way tie in reader popularity between Nightshade from A Mighty Fortress, Kiki McGee from The Brigade, and Rooney Wingfield from A Distant Thunder.
Of course, Rooney is a genuine redneck girl from South Carolina, so she and Shane make a matched pair.
This is Rooney's Theme.
Oh, I wish I was a tuna wolf hanging on a tree.
Every time I love walk by, take a little bite of me.
Take a bite of me, my love, take a bite of me.
Every time I love walk by, take a little bite of me.
You ride your great mare, I'll ride the drone.
You get there before I do, leave my guy alone.
Train on the island, heard that whistle blow.
Thought I heard someone say, yonder comes my home.
Oh, I'm going across the mountain, going on a swing.
When I get to the other side, I hear my true love sing.
Don't you hear that banjo sing?
Wish that guy was mine.
Don't you hear that banjo sing?
I wish that guy was mine.
Oh, Charlie E's a nice young man.
Charlie E's a dandy.
Oh, Charlie E's a nice young man.
Bees the girls on candy.
Going down the river to feed my sheep.
Going down the river, Charlie.
Going down the river to feed my sheep.
Gotta feed them all on Harley.
Hey!
Oh, I wish I was a junapple hanging on a tree.
Every time I love walk by, take a little bite of me.
Take a bite of me, my love.
Take a bite of me.
Every time I love walk by, take a little bite of me.
Woo!
Bye!
you you you you you you Thank you.
Okay, this next section of music is going to take a little explaining, and in order to understand it, you have to be familiar with my Northwest novels.
Now, I tend to open the subsections of my books with quotes from what I call Northwest rebel songs.
Most of these are unabashedly plagiarized from traditional Irish rebel songs, of the kind all the drunks used to sing in the pubs in Dublin and Tralee just before closing time.
I have always had a theory that if we can ever get our people to sing like that, we'll be halfway to winning our freedom.
However, I do get occasional questions and comments from readers who don't know these songs in the original form.
Now, they can read my altered lyrics in the books, but they don't know the tune, and not being part of that culture and background, they basically don't get it.
So, what I'll try to do in this part of the podcast is play you some of the Northwest Rebel songs in their original form that I stole them from, so you can at least get an idea of what the tune sounds like.
You guys might want to get your copies of the novels ready in your hand or on your computer, so you can follow the words along with the song, and maybe you'll get some idea of what I'm trying to convey here.
Now, I actually opened the brigade with the St. Crispin's Day speech from Shakespeare's Henry V that I played at the beginning of this week's show, and in fact, I also quoted it in The Hill of the Ravens as well.
Now, here's some of the quasi-Northwest rebel songs that you may be familiar with from the various Northwest novels in their original versions, mostly Irish, so that you can hear what the original song sounds like.
First off, from the Hill of the Ravens, and also from Freedom's Sons, there is one of the most famous of Irish rebel songs, The Foggy Dew.
This is Paddy Reilly.
It was down the Glen one eastern hall From a city paradise There are no lines of marching men As bad ones pass no by No five did hum their battle drum Did sound this red
tattoo But the angel's bell or the lippy spell Rang out of the fall of the air Riding proudly high over Dublin town They hung out the flag of war It was better to die beneath an Irish guy From a silver silver bar And from the
plains of royal meat Strong men came hurrying through While the Tanya's haunt with their long range Tailed by the fall of the sea It was England but our wildest gold As for nations might be pleased But their lonely graves are by silver and
blue planes The fringe of the great long seas Oh how they died by Pierce's sight Or fought with cattle brood Their names we would keep With a billion sweep The shroud of the fall of the fall of the air The braveest bell The braveest bell The solemn bell And mornfully and
clear For those who dined at Easter time The springtime of the year The world is gazing deep for me At those still hearted men but few Who bore the fight that freedom's white Might shine through the fall of the blue Back to the
glen I rode again My heart with grief was sore For I parted with those valiant friends I never would see no more And to and fro in my dreams I will go I kneel and I pray for you Oh slavery fled He revered And he fell
near the fall He healed you Thank you you I think you'll be able to see where that one comes from.
This is the Wolf Tones.
And once again, we have the Wolf Tones here with the original.
As you may gather, they're from Belfast, and they specialize in this kind of repertoire.
They did back in the day.
Oh, Father, why are you so sad on this bright Easter morn?
When Irish men are proud and glad of the land where they were born.
Some they say, and memories few are far off distant days.
When being just a lad like you, I joined the IRA.
Where are the lads who stood with me when history was made?
Oh, Grandma Cree, I long to see the voice of the old brigade.
From hills and farms the call to arms was heard by one and all.
And from the glen came brave young men to answer Ireland's call.
It was long ago we faced the foe, the old brigade and me.
But by my side they fought and died that Ireland might be free.
Where are the lads who stood with me when history was made?
Oh, Grandma Cree, I long to see the voice of the old brigade.
And now, my boy, I've told you why, on Easter morn I sigh.
For I recall my comrades all of dark old days gone by.
I think of men who fought in glen with rifle and grenade.
May heaven keep the men who sleep from the ranks of the old brigade.
Where are the lads who stood with me when history was made?
Oh, Grandma Cree, I long to see the voice of the old brigade.
May heaven keep the men who stood with me when history was made.
In May of 1933, Cornelia Codrianu established a new unit of the Romanian legionaries.
They called themselves the Death Squad.
While traveling, as they approached the town of Gravada, they were attacked by armed police and arrested.
The following day, the local prosecutor found them innocent, proclaiming that they had done nothing other than travel in a truck singing hymns.
Later, in the county of Arad, the Jews, along with the local police, informed the locals that the legionaries were red bands coming over from Hungary.
The squad was severely beaten by the locals and arrested.
They were acquitted and gained much sympathy from the public.
I'll read out the lyrics to the next song first.
We are the death squad, from Moldova we come to-day.
The dice of fate has been cast, either we win or we die.
We carry with us the flag of a new holy faith, on which is written with blood great deeds and victories.
There's much sorrow in our country, for the foreigner rules us.
A beggar in his own home, the Romanian has become.
Therefore we fight to-day.
We begin to rid the fatherland from all its thieves, so that honor may be enthroned.
Alongside our captain, we will gladly sacrifice ourselves over the corpses of our enemies.
We shall build a new country.
With a smile on our face, we will look death in the eye, for we are the death squad.
Either we win, or we die.
This is Ecepa Morti, the Death Squad.
Suntem echipa morții, din Moldova azi venim, Aruncat e zarul în sorții, ori-nvingem, ori-murim.
Aruncat e zarul sorții, or invinge, murmurim.
Puritam cu noi stintartul uneștinte noi credinți, Peneste scris cu sânge, fapte mari și biruinți.
Peneste scris cu sânge, fapte mari și biruinți.
Eșeal de multă-nțară, că străinii, Sfântul 1. Cercetor la el acasă a ajuns bietul român.
CERCE TOR LA EL ACAS��, AJUNG BIETUL ROM��N.
De aceea azi la luptăm, noi pornit am să scăpăm, patria de toți tâlhare, ci să iar s-o întronăm.
Patria de toți tâlhare, ci să iar s-o întronăm, în rând cu capitanul bucuros ne vom jerfi, peste leșurile dușmanețară nouă vom clădi.
Peste leșurile dușmanețară nouă vom clădi, cu zâmbetul pe buze, moartea-n față o privim, că suntem echipa morții, ori-nvingem, ori-murim.
Că suntem echipa morții, ori-nvingem, ori-murim.
Thank you.
I get it, and I'm not bothered by it.
Like so many of our kind, you people who think that are what the Jews have made you.
It will be a long time before you can break out of that mold and that mindset, and some of you never will.
Now, you were raised in the 20th and 21st centuries when the history of our people was being systematically erased from our consciousness, and to many of you, I'm sure what I've been saying and the music that I've been playing for you here today is mostly gibberish.
No problem.
It just makes me very, very sad that so many of you, especially young men and women, have been so cruelly and viciously ripped away from your past and your racial and cultural inheritance.
The mighty and magnificent history of the white race is something that you have a right to and which the Jews have spent your entire lives denying you, and that makes me more angry and upset than I can express here.
Now, I can't give it all back to you, upload it into your brains in one fell swoop, but I can try to get you to wrap your minds around little bits and pieces here and there, to the point where, all of a sudden, I hope you'll realize what an incredible void the kikes have left in your life.
The Jews have taken away William Wallace, John Wycliffe, and Shakespeare, and in return, they gave you Ronald McDonald and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
May they burn in hell for it.
Okay, one more bit of history and then I'll wind this up.
In 1845, Admiral Sir John Franklin left England in two ships, the Erebus and the Terror, along with 24 officers and 110 seamen of the Royal Navy, in the last major expedition out of Europe to attempt to locate the Northwest Passage through the Arctic.
About two ships got stuck in the ice somewhere north of Hudson Bay.
Some of the crew stayed with the vessels, and some left the ships in an attempt to walk civilization down in Canada and bring back help.
The ships themselves disappeared into the ice flows, although for many years afterwards, various explorers and whalers and Eskimos reported seeing them drifting through the ice in the far distance.
But they've never been found.
The men who struck out overland all died along the way.
Now we know this because from that day to this, various mapping and whaling expeditions and nowadays oil exploration teams have found their graves, dozens of frozen and perfectly preserved bodies from 1846 and 47 buried under rock cairns, with their names scribbled on old sheets of diary paper and whatnot.
I've seen some photos of this on the internet, and I swear to God you'd think some of these 170-year-old dead men are about to sit up and speak.
They're so lifelike.
The grave of Sir John Franklin himself has never been found.
This is Pentangle.
*Music*
Swinging in my helmet, I fell asleep.
I dreamed a dream and I thought it true.
concerning franklin With a hundred seamen, he said...
To the frozen ocean in the month of May To seek a passage around the port Where we poor seamen do sometimes go Through cruel hardships they remain strong There's ships
on mountains of ice was grown Only the Eskimo in this skin canoe Is the only one that ever came for
me The fate
of Franklin, no man may know.
The fate of Franklin, no tongue can tell.
Lord, Franklin alone With his sails do you well guitar solo Now my burden gives me pain.
My long-lost Franklin, I would cross the man.
Ten thousand pounds should I freely give.
To say on earth that my friend Lift up your gates The Aryan nation marches Our
world is free The Aryan nation rules So comrades all oppressed By powers of darkness We overcame them With the force of light So comrades all oppressed
By powers of darkness We
overcame them with the force of light Lift up your hearts The Aryan nation rises Our race is free The world belongs to us The age of
light The dawn of the heart A new morning will raise again Our sacred swastika The age
of light The dawn of the heart A new morning will raise again A sacred swastika He sat in a
room In a square, the color of blood He drew the whole world If there was a way that he could He'd sit and he'd die
And the snow fell.
Covering the dreams and ideals.
And the snow fell.
Freezing the blood and the wheels.
And the snow fell.
They had to keep warm for survival and the snow fell and defeated the beast's only rival.
They took the old roads like Napoleon had taken before.
They fought as the forces of light against the darkness in a holy war.
One day they were looking around at the sky.
The sun shining on the cold flowers The next day they were freezing to death In the snow when the ice cold showers And the snow fell Covering the dreams and ideals And the snow fell Freezing the blood and the wheels And the snow fell Had to keep
warm for survival And the snow fell And defeated the beast's only rival Then came the deadly road back From the steps of their retreat The coal raked their bodies But worse was the pain and
defeat We're good to
go.
To keep warm for survival And the snow fell And defeated the beast's only rival You finally came back To the borders of your fatherland Now enemies came Traitors everywhere We're
dreams and ideals and the snow fell freezing the blood and the wheels and the snow fell they had to keep warm for survival and the snow fell
And defeated the beasts only rival And defeated the beasts only rival And defeated the beasts only rival Tears
will fall like snow.
Who may melt your heart or lies?
Who may only know?
The musky scent of Earth's decay hangs heavy on the breeze And breezes turn to winds one day and rock the very trees When you rage through rusty woods, leaves will fall like rain Who can calm your heart?
Heart so cruel, who can only name?
I'll see you next time.
Now comes the solstice night.
Amen.
I wish you safe and sound Whether snow be light Or heavy on the ground Our hearts bring back the light May
stars fill up our sight With wishes coming true My wish this solstice night Is grace and peace to you Now comes the time of year When shadow We're
O'er the sleepy fields of winter Bringing beauty to our eyes Sharp winter Sharp winter
May this I be blessed May this I be blessed May this I be blessed Through all your living Through your loving To the heart of the home
Leads in the eyes of the wonder Be your own charm When the morning takes the great joy Upon this solstice night My love is the only one
I wish you safe and sound Where the snow This
is grace and peace to you.
I wish this soul still is night.
is grace and peace to you.
Grace and peace to you.
Before I decided not to do any shows this month, I had already started working on a Christmas presentation.
These are excerpts from interviews that were conducted with men who participated in World War I. And if you haven't heard the story of the quote-unquote Christmas truce, It's one that has always struck me on a very deep emotional level.
We say phrases like no more brother wars, and we mean it.
But these men actually did it.
At least for a day.
I know this sounds like a fairy tale, but I assure you it's perfectly true.
The most wonderful day.
You will hardly credit what I'm going to tell you, but thousands of our men will be writing home today, telling the same strange and wonderful story.
This is history's most memorable Christmas.
A celebration in the midst of slaughter.
The first few months of the Great War were an incredible period.
It's a clash of two mighty empires, the French and the Germans, and they both have their own plans.
One, the Germans are going to sweep round through Belgium and crash into northern France, aiming up either side of Paris, whilst the French are going to drive into their lost provinces of Alsace-Lorraine.
So you get this sort of circular, almost motion, and those are the two great visions of what will happen.
What does happen is it all goes wrong.
The Germans had come sweeping through Belgium and into France with their Schlieffen plan, the intention being to knock the French out of the war very, very quickly so that they could then turn and face the Russians on the eastern front.
And the plan had failed.
It had stalled on the River Marne, where the French and the British had counterattacked.
This is crucial.
It forces back the Germans.
They get to the Aisne.
They start to dig in.
And from there, race to the sea.
It's unbelievable.
They're not racing to the sea.
They're trying to outflank each other.
These first few months are very different from our usual image of the Western Front.
This is a war of movement.
It's open warfare.
There are no trenches.
It's fought in the open, obviously making use of whatever cover there was, so very often using drainage ditches at the side of fields, not proper big defensive positions.
Nobody is expecting what's going to happen.
They're just crashing into each other.
Not only is the nature of fighting different from the later war, the people fighting are different too.
The image of the 18-year-old Tommy is completely false about the BEF in 1940.
They are a much bigger range of ages.
They are not 18. A lot of them are in their early 20s.
Some of them are older.
If you get the NCOs, they could be any age, up to 40. And, of course, the officers would also be older.
The British Army that goes to war in August 1914 was an entirely professional, regular army.
There were no conscripts at all.
These were all people who joined the army for a career.
And the British Expeditionary Force were made up of all the battalions which had been on home service.
And in peacetime, the home service battalions ran at just over half strength.
So instead of 1,000 men in peacetime, there'd be 500 or 600 men.
Which meant that when the war broke out, the numbers had to be made back up to 1,000.
And the way that was done was by recalling men who were on the reserve.
What it meant in practice was that almost a half of each of those battalions that go to France are made up with men who are out of practice, who might not be that fit, who certainly haven't handled some of the weapons or the equipment before.
And so, whilst the British Army does have incredibly good kit, it's certainly not the case that every single soldier that goes to France is in absolutely tip-top fighting condition.
This professional army is already being decimated.
By Christmas, the British have lost nearly 90,000 men.
But the German advance has been halted.
Their dream of winning the war in a swift, overwhelming attack has failed.
Both sides dig in.
From now on, it's a siege.
How'd you end up in a trench?
People often wonder that.
Well, the thing is, you're not intending to be in a trench.
What happens?
You're in a firefight with the Germans.
They're shooting at you.
You scrape with your little entrenching tool.
You try and get anything, anything.
Men will hide behind a blade of grass, they'll always tell you.
But you just try and get that five or six inches down, put the earth in front of you, and then make it a bit deeper.
Those first trenches come about when both sides...
Literally can't get the better of one another, so that both sides on the opposite side of a field find themselves not being able to get any further forward and literally dig in where they are.
And as time goes on, what happens is that they join them together.
And so from these little personal scrape holes, gradually develops into, firstly, a sort of a longer bit of trench, an outpost, and then they're joined together, and gradually a front line develops.
By November 1914, The trench network, if you like, has already started to evolve.
It's still very crude.
In most places, it certainly doesn't have the whole front line, support line, reserve line organisation that we'll see later.
Its main purpose, the main purpose of all trenches, is simply to make it safer for soldiers to live.
The minute that you get below the surface, you're out of rifle fire.
You can still be got by artillery, but it's certainly much, much safer to move around in daytime if you can stay below the ground.
The trenches evolve, they connect with other trenches, but it's still a long way from what we would think of as a very well-organised proper trench with proper fire bays, which come later.
The Western Front we know is beginning to form.
The soldiers are settling into trench life.
It's a miserable...
Boring existence.
What marks it out?
A boring routine.
Freezing cold.
It's terrible.
A typical day in the trenches in 1914 was very different to a typical day in the trenches later.
For the majority of the war, most of the time the soldiers would work at night and they would sleep through the day because it was safer.
But by the end of 1914, those lessons haven't yet been learned.
So we still have a situation where soldiers are pretty much sleeping at night and then working during the day with all the casualties you'd expect of fellas being picked off by German snipers just because they suddenly get careless.
You have to set sentries out, sentries watching over no man's hand.
The rest of the men, well, during the daytime, often sitting there writing letters home or attending to trench maintenance.
And this is the day it's spent.
It's just boring.
Drainage in the trenches was often poor, making mud a constant problem.
I used to think I knew what mud was before I came out here, but I was quite mistaken.
The mud here varies from six inches to three and four feet, even five feet.
And it's so sticky that my men used to arrive in the trenches with bare feet.
Having cold feet isn't just unpleasant.
It's a serious danger.
Men are being sent to hospital due to frostbite and trench foot.
This is soldiers just trying to make sure that they can keep their feet dry in really adverse conditions, taking the boots and socks and putties off at least once a day, drying them off, putting a drier pair of socks back on.
That was a crucial thing because very, very quickly fellows would get trench foot if they didn't keep their feet dry.
How do you keep clean in the trenches?
Well, there's a bit of a problem.
How would you keep clean in a trench full of 18-inch of water and mud?
What they would do, they would get probably three inches of water in the bottom of the mess tin, which was what they called the D-type mess tin, because it was a sort of a D-shaped tin with a shallow lid.
Half an inch of the water would be poured into the lid, and they would use that half inch to shave with.
So you'd lather up your soap, you'd shave your face.
Make sure that you rinsed off the razor in the top half of the mest in so you didn't get any of the bristles mixed up in the water that you're going to wash the rest of you with.
And then the two and a half inches left, you would use that to wash your face, you'd wash your hands, you'd unbutton your shirt so you'd wash under your armpits, you'd just button it back up and dry yourself off, you'd unbutton your trousers, you'd have a rummage around and you'd do the same there, button yourself back up.
And it is quite extraordinary because should you ever do this, which I have on numerous occasions, It's just like having a bath.
You really do feel clean because what you've done, you've washed all the sweaty bits.
So despite not having much water, every day the fellows manage to keep themselves as clean as possible.
It's just as important to keep your equipment clean, particularly your weapon.
Very often the image that we have from war films is these fellows completely and utterly caked in mud in First World battles.
They would have to avoid that, because the minute you do that, you'll be out of action within minutes.
You won't be able to do the job.
So obsessively, they would be cleaning weapons two or three times a day.
All the rounds of ammunition would come out of the pouches, they'd keep those clean, they'd put them back in again.
Because that sticky mud, the minute that you've got it on your clip of ammunition, you push that clip of ammunition in the rifle, you've pushed all the mud in with it, by the second or third round it will jam.
One of the high points of the day is mealtimes.
Or perhaps not.
In the trenches, you can forget hot food.
You're not going to get hot food.
What you get is standard British Army rations.
And that is aimed to feed the body.
It's not to feed the soul, that's for sure.
British soldiers rarely cooked anything in their own trenches at this early part of the war for the simple reason that if you create any form of smoke, you will simply invite German artillery fire.
So what do you get?
You get the staples.
Bully beef.
Now, we call that corned beef now.
They're sick to death of it.
If you were lucky, you got a loaf of bread.
Sometimes you'd get cheese and you'd get jam.
Always plum and apple on the western front.
And this is all you got.
Repetitive.
Repetitive.
But enough to keep body and soul together.
Does the army care about your soul?
No.
All they want is you fit to be able to fight.
You've got enough calories, you've got the right sort of food to enable you to continue to fight for your country, and that's all they care about.
To fill the time, soldiers would smoke, play cards, and dream of home.
British soldiers were notoriously sentimental, so certainly most of them would have photographs of wives and girlfriends or family members.
Those that could read and write would write letters endlessly whenever paper was available.
I mean, it's very telling, really, that a lot of the letters that still survived from British soldiers throughout the entire war, nearly all of the surviving ones, are the letters that they wrote home, because, in practice, the letters that they received.
It would very often be read numerous times before eventually being used when I went to the latrine.
The night brought little relief.
How do you get to sleep in the freezing cold?
It's so cold.
You're frozen to the bone.
Now, that's an expression we use when we're waiting for a bus.
This is frozen to the bone.
your legs are covered in freezing cold water.
You can't take them out and put them somewhere dry.
You've just got to stand there.
So they literally sleep on the firestep.
In some instances, they'll have built themselves crude shelters, very often with doors at this stage in the war, doors taken off houses nearby, which won't stop shell fire, but might well keep the rain off.
But most of the time they are just sitting on the firestep in the mud.
You'd try and find a sandbag to sit on, and you'd put your overcoat over your head and try and make a tent of it.
And you'd huddle down under that, just sitting down, but it was a very, very broken sleep.
...
Sleeping is difficult in the front line.
Very, very difficult.
It's a horrible existence because you're so cold all the time.
The men were exhausted.
It's not to be forgotten how...
Terrible an existence this was for the men at the front, because that explains a lot of what happens at Christmas 1914.
The daily life of a German soldier in the trenches at that period of time is very similar to that of a British soldier.
Opposite the British regiments in Flanders and northern France in December 1914, a lot of the duty of the German soldier...
He's devoted to somehow trying to avoid those trenches, to flood or to cave in.
He's busy extending and fortifying on what he has, and all that in addition of keeping an eye on the foe, patrolling, keeping everyone supplied.
At this early stage, in this area of the front, the deep and nicely furnished dugouts that many people associate with German First World War trenches do not exist.
So, life in the trenches in winter is freezing cold, it's very wet, hygiene is poor, and many soldiers suffer from bowel problems, for example.
It's bone-breaking, physically exhausting, and mentally draining routine.
Flanders is just one great morass.
Day and night, we stand up to our knees in mud and water.
We have to wrap our legs up to our thighs in sandbags just to survive.
On top of this all, this mad gun battle goes on across this forsaken plain, stretching out in front of us as flat as a tabletop.
The Germans are now fighting on two fronts.
Russian armies are pressing on their eastern border.
French intelligence suggests the Germans are moving troops east to counter this threat.
The French high command...
Traditionally, campaigning stops for the winter because the days are too short, the weather's too bad, and everybody needs the opportunity to regroup, to rebuild their armies, to resupply, ready for the campaign the following spring.
However, as so often in the story of the British Army in the First World War, the French, who are the dominant partners in our coalition, say that what they really need...
Is an attack by the British to keep the pressure on the Germans.
Because there's also a very real feeling that the Germans are now relaxing.
After the first Battle of Ypres, they didn't push through.
They were now just settling down for the long haul.
And that was something that the British and the French really didn't want to happen.
They were very keen to keep the Germans on their toes and not give them the chance to dig in, not give them the chance to improve their defences and to push them out as quickly as they possibly could.
And the inevitable happened and they end up having to launch attacks with very little preparation, with very little artillery support.
In December, what's often forgotten is that the French are still...
Really intent on driving into the German lines.
They launch a series of absolutely massive attacks.
One on the 17th of December, smashing in the Artois area, that's near Vimy.
And then a few days later, they smash home again in the Champagne.
Now just to give you the scale of this, that's quarter of a million men attacking, supported by 600 guns in the Champagne.
Just think about that for the moment.
That's more than...
And the whole British Army.
And they're going over.
That's just one of two major attacks.
These attacks last for weeks.
They are smashing into the Germans.
They are intent on trying to win the war.
Break the lines and get back to open warfare.
By the time that these attacks are happening in mid to late December 1914, the British Army really is tired out.
They've lost the majority of the old pre-war regular soldiers who've either been killed, wounded or captured in the first few months fighting.
A lot of reservists have made up the numbers and when the numbers of reservists had finally run out, they're replaced with Kitchener volunteers who are having to be sent to regular battalions just to make up the numbers.
Commander of the French, Geoff.
He doesn't order Sir John French, but it intimates to him that it is expected that the British will do their bit.
They also will attack.
What he wants is the whole BEF to attack.
We water it down, then we water it down some more.
We end up with just two battalions of Second Corps attacking.
The poor old Gordon Highlanders and the Royal Scots.
Just two battalions.
And that's all that goes over the top.
Now, why is that bad?
Well, if you attack on a narrow front, that means all the enemy to your right and all the enemy to your left can shoot into that area.
Whereas if you attack on a broad front, it's obviously reduced.
I've just come from the trenches where I had my first baptism of fire.
I will never forget.
When I saw my mates knocked over, I felt a bit giddy.
The ground was in an awful state.
We were up to our knees in mud and water, shivering with cold.
This is terrible.
And those two battalions are slaughtered.
And you can picture the scene.
When they go over the top, the whistles blow, the bombardment, if you can hear it.
Because there's not that many guns and they haven't got that many shells.
the bombardment stops and they go across no man's land.
He let her come!
He let her come!
The Germans see you coming, and they open fire.
The tack, tack, tack of the machine guns.
And then after a period, the shell fire starts.
And the poor old Gordon Highlands, the Royal Scots, are slaughtered in no man's land.
Men falling all round them.
There are only two weak battalions.
That's all that's going forward.
And they are slaughtered.
The attacks in December are an utter disaster.
One battalion, the first Gordon Highlanders...
Loses 75% of their officers and over half their men, killed or wounded.
And by the end, not one sector of enemy trench is in British hands.
As soon as we went up, the Germans let us have it, and we were going down like raindrops.
As our trenches was only 70 yards apart, we retired and then made the second charge but received the same.
It's like being in a blacksmith shop, watching him swing a hammer on Red Hot Shoe and the sparks flying all round you.
But instead of them being sparks, they were bullets.
Some of the men that were wounded in those attacks were still crawling back or being rescued from no man's land two or three days later.
Imagine being wounded, lying there, bleeding, unable to walk.
How are you going to get back?
Imagine freezing cold beyond belief.
Imagine what it must have been like for those men.
It's difficult to imagine.
It really is.
I've lost words.
It was a pitiful sight to see and hear our comrades dying and couldn't get out to help them as it meant certain death if we'd moved.
So we had to lay there from 6.30 until 8.15 in the morning.
And as an angel sent down from heaven, it came over very misty and this being our only chance, we made good of it.
So we crawl halfway and then make a run for it.
We could not see where we were going, so we fell over our comrades who were dead.
The attacks and counter-attacks peter out in late December, leaving stalemate and stasis.
Is there any good side to this?
Well, yes.
One thing is that people are watching.
People like Douglas Haig, who was commanding First Corps, and he was appalled.
By the nature of this attack.
And when he made an attack, Nerve Chappelle, things still went wrong.
But he'd learnt they attacked on a wider front.
They had a bigger, smashing barrage.
They targeted known positions of German machine guns.
They took out German mortars.
They tried to suppress German artillery fire before they went over the top.
They used aircraft to map German positions to target the shellfire accurately.
So...
The British Army is starting to learn.
So even amidst the complete failures of those December attacks, the British Army was learning.
But that is, that's no good if you've been killed or wounded in those attacks.
The mood is depressed.
There's no two ways about it.
It's freezing cold.
It actually starts to snow in this period.
The mud and water in the trenches starts to turn into slush and ice.
What are men feeling?
They're feeling this war's not going to be over any time soon.
They can't see an end to the war.
That means that they can't see an end to their personal torment.
On Christmas Eve, the frost comes.
The battlefield is transformed.
The mud hardens.
The puddles freeze.
There's a thick morning mist.
The wind.
There is something in the air.
It's even felt back at British HQ, who issue this stern statement.
It is thought possible that the enemy may be contemplating an attack during Christmas or New Year.
Special vigilance will be maintained during this period.
The enemy are contemplating something, but it isn't an attack.
We posted a tiny Christmas tree in our dugout.
The company commander, myself the lieutenant, and the two orderlies.
We placed the second lighted Christmas tree on the breastwork.
Something in the direction of the German lines caused us to rub our eyes and look again.
Here and there, showing just above their parapet, we could see very faintly what looked like very small coloured lights.
What was this?
Was it some prearranged signal in the forerunner of an attack?
Things really start to change on Christmas Eve.
Now, why is that?
The German family would celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve.
That's when they would have the big meal.
That's when they'd give the presents.
A lot of the traditions of the German Christmas are what we fondly think are ours.
Christmas trees.
that comes from Germany.
On Christmas Eve, the Germans start to celebrate their Christmas.
Their post is delivered from home.
They've got their letters from their family.
That makes them feel warm, even if they're freezing cold.
They start to put up Christmas trees.
They're sent lots of Christmas trees from home.
They put them up in the trenches.
They decorate them with candles.
There's lots of accounts that the Christmas trees appear above their trenches with lights.
And they start singing carols.
How did the British react?
Well, they're suspicious.
Suddenly, lights began to appear along the German parapet, which were evidently makeshift Christmas trees adorned with lighted candles which burnt steadily in the still, frosty air.
We were very suspicious and were discussing this strange move of the enemy when something even stranger happened.
The Germans were actually singing.
Not very loud, but there was no mistaking it.
We began to get interested.
Suddenly, across the snow-clad No Man's Land, a strong clear voice rang out.
No other sound but this unknown singer's voice.
Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht, alles schläft einsam wach, nur das traute hochheilige Paar.
Hol der Knabe im lockigen Haar.
And then, you know, someone's singing Silent Night in German.
And they join in, they applaud, they start to shout things backwards and forwards across normalcy.
Merry Christmas, Fritz!
Merry Christmas, Fritz!
Merry Christmas, Fritzy!
Now, one thing that's interesting is a lot of the Germans could speak English.
They're better educated than our lads are, I fear.
But that's not all.
Many of them had worked as waiters or in butcher shops in London, in Manchester, in the great cities.
There were lots of Germans who'd lived in England.
And therefore, there was quite a bit of band.
They could shout out across no man's land.
And of course, the British, you know, cheery, chirpy, cocky stuff, would shout back.
So you've got lots of people who say, how are you doing, Tommy?
And then the British would say, waiter, waiter.
Because they've been German-weighted.
And this sort of banter goes across No Man's Land.
And that's going on on the night of the 24th, Christmas Eve.
I love you, God.
First the Germans would sing one of their carols, and then we would sing one of ours.
And I thought, well, this was really a most extraordinary thing.
Two nations, both singing the same carol in the middle of a war.
Dearest Dorothy, just a line from the trenches on Christmas Eve.
A topping night with not much firing going on and both sides singing.
It will be interesting to see what happens tomorrow.
My orders to the Coy are not to start firing unless the Germans do.
Best love from your loving brother, Arthur.
Sleepy heavenly peace.
you And there develops a warmer atmosphere than you might well have expected.
Exactly as British generals have warned might happen if you live in close conjunction with the enemy.
The Germans are there.
They're clearly human.
They are not the pickle-hound monster.
You can see them.
They're over there celebrating Christmas.
That's not a monstrous thing.
That's recognizably human, isn't it?
On the German and British side, we can see men who share a deep cultural bond.
And who are not only fighting one another, but also share the same deprivations, weather, terrain conditions in a foreign country, or far removed from their families and their loved ones at home.
This is a cultural bond, and that is the driving force for the Christmas truce.
The goodwill on Christmas Eve is widespread, but there are sectors where there is no truce.
One letter from an unnamed officer in the rifles shows a hostility bred from his traumatic experience over the previous weeks and months.
I found the Bosch's trench looking like the Thames on Henley regatta night.
They'd got little Christmas trees burning all along the parapet of their trench, no truce had been proclaimed, and I was all for not allowing the blighters to enjoy themselves, especially as they'd killed one of our men that afternoon.
But my captain, who hadn't seen our wounded, going mad and slowly dying outside the German trenches on the Aisne.
Wouldn't let me shoot.
However, I soon had an excuse as when the Germans fired at us, so I quickly lined up my platoon and had all those Christmas trees down and out.
And on Christmas Eve, a lot of Germans had put little candles in jam jars all the way along their parapets, and Colonel Scott Shepard of the Worcesters refers to his men shooting them out one after the other, which was a sort of true spirit, a Christmas spirit of 1914 in some places.
Towards midnight...
There seemed to be some commotion in the enemy trenches, and shortly afterwards a lantern was raised above the enemy parapet.
We were immediately ordered to open fire, and thus what was undoubtedly a friendly gesture was brutally repulsed.
And the French, on the whole, seem less keen.
The Christmas Truce is a collection of individual incidents that happen spontaneously all along the front line, mostly.
Between the British and Germans, in some places between the Belgians and Germans, in some places between the French and Germans, although it's fair to say that because France and Belgium have been occupied by the Germans, they're not quite so keen on trucing as the British are.
The war diary of one German unit, facing the French, comments...
On both days of the Christmas festival, the bloody game continued.
Dawn, on Christmas Day 1914.
It's another misty morning, and the British soldiers are getting their Christmas presents.
The British public and British industry responded fantastically to having their British expeditionary force in France and Belgium at the end of 1914.
All sorts of companies provided gifts and chocolate and woolen goods and comforts, It was the gift from Princess Mary, who set up a gift fund towards the end of 1914 to send a gift from herself and the women of the Empire to all of those soldiers and sailors who were serving literally across the world at Christmas 1914.
And it was a staggering undertaking because every single soldier fighting on the Western Front received a gift.
It fell into roughly two categories as far as the soldiers were concerned, which was about two-thirds of them were for smokers and a third were for non-smokers.
But for many, the true gift of Christmas Day is the peace.
The silence seemed extraordinary after the usual din.
From all sides, birds seemed to arrive, and we hardly ever see a bird generally, which shows how complete the silence and quiet was.
It was Christmas Day.
It's foggy at the start.
And what becomes apparent is you can see the Christmas trees, the German Christmases, the lights.
And gradually the Germans start shouting across and people start showing themselves.
And it's Christmas Day.
You don't shoot them.
And people get more and more bold on both sides.
They're shouting out to each other.
Tommy!
And they're gradually engaging, and gradually the bolder spirits start to climb out of the trench and wave, that kind of thing.
And you get both sides starting to respond to each other.
And then once you're visible, no-one's shooting.
So you move into no man's land.
*Sings*
It's quite an amazing process.
It involves an incredible amount of trust.
And that's interesting, because they don't trust each other.
So it's a strange phenomenon.
As the soldiers emerge from the trenches, they get a clear view of their enemy for the first time.
The British began to wave to us, and our men returned the gestures.
Gradually, they left their trenches.
Nobody thought of opening fire.
That which only hours ago I should have thought was nonsense, I now saw with my own eyes.
Truces were a very common thing in warfare, and always have been.
Both sides would often take the opportunity just to have a truce, to clear the battlefield, to bury the dead, and just take a breather.
But the Christmas truce was quite different.
Both sides spontaneously in different places, deciding just to stop fighting for a few days, was quite unusual.
But I think that it's really important to say that it was of its time, and it was of its time because of the people that took part as much as anything.
In many places, the initial motivation for the Christmas Day truce is to bury the dead.
At about 9am on Christmas Day, an English officer, accompanied by two of his men, came across and asked for a ceasefire until midnight to bury the dead.
This was willingly granted.
The officer came out.
We gravely saluted each other, and I then pointed to nine dead Germans lying in midfield and suggested burying them, which both sides proceeded to do.
We gave them some wooden crosses for them, which completely won them over.
And soon, the men were on the best terms and laughing.
And in at least one sector, the British and the Germans come together for one of the most memorable religious services of the First World War.
With the dead buried.
It's time to celebrate Christmas together.
British and Bavarians, previously the worst of enemies, stood there shaking hands and exchanging items.
Immediately, one came up to me, shook my hand and gave me some cigarettes.
Another gave me a handkerchief.
A third signed his name on a field postcard and a fourth wrote his address in my notebook.
Everyone mingled and conversed to the best of their ability.
It was a moving moment.
Between the trenches stood the most hated and bitter enemies and sang Christmas crudders.
All my life, I shall never forget the sight.
Just do you think that while you were eating your turkey and that, I was out talking and shaking hands with the very men I had been trying to kill a few hours before.
It was astounding.
You will hardly credit this, but it is the truth.
Fancy shooting at the Germans and going over to wish them a Merry Christmas.
I don't think it's happened in the world's history before.
You would have thought that peace had been declared.
This was my first sight of them at close quarters.
Here they were, the actual practical soldiers of the German army.
There was not an atom of hate on either side that day.
We just said how bloody it was in that mud, how we hated it all.
They said, we are Saxons.
You're Anglo-Saxons.
Why are we fighting?
The Russians can't fight.
The French won't fight.
And you're the only people who do fight.
Why are we doing this?
We laughed and chaffed each other for about half an hour in no man's land.
We shook hands, wished each other good luck.
One fellow said, will you send this off to my girlfriend in Manchester?
So I took his letter, franked it, and sent it off when I got back.
A German lighting a Scotsman cigarette and...
Vice versa.
Exchanging cigarettes and souvenirs.
Where they couldn't talk the language, they were making themselves understood by signs.
And everyone seemed to be getting on nicely.
Here we were, laughing and chatting to men whom only a few hours before we were trying to kill.
The End There's an exchange of gifts.
Now, what did they give each other?
Well...
I'm like, I think we get the better out of this, the British, because what happens is the Germans will give you cigars, or perhaps a German lager, and what do we give them?
Oh, tin and bully beef!
Well, I'm not sure that's a good exchange.
But there's small exchanges of gifts.
Lots of them refer to cigars being given.
There are many, many photographs.
That's why there's never been the slightest doubt that this was a widespread process.
Photographs are taken and they engage in banter.
Some of them debate the war.
That's not a good idea.
It doesn't generally go too well.
The events of Christmas 1914 are, in my opinion, a clear indicator that the cultural similarities between the British and the Germans, which include the shared Christmas tradition, were in many cases stronger than any kind of culturally driven hatred or state propaganda on both sides.
You can rationally explain a ceasefire negotiation with the need to bury the fallen, But that doesn't explain why soldiers of the Bavarian 16th Reserve Infantry Regiment, for example, in which the young Adolf Hitler served, danced with British troops in no man's land.
And it doesn't explain why in front of the lines held by the 6th Bavarian Reserve Division, many hundreds of German and British soldiers met up and mixed between the lines singing hymns and exchanging gifts and letters, or why group photographs of smiling German and British soldiers exist.
By breakfast time, nearly all our men were on the ground between the trenches and were the greatest pals.
We had a rare old jollification which included football in which the Germans took part.
We were in the front line.
We were about 300 yards from the Germans and we had, I think, On Christmas Eve we'd been singing carols and this, that and the other, and the Germans had been doing the same.
And we'd been shouting to each other, sometimes rude remarks, more often just joking remarks.
Eventually a German said, "Tomorrow you no shoot, we no shoot." Music playing.
you So for those soldiers who were in the trenches over winter 1914, the conditions would have gotten gradually worse and worse.
You got a lot of rain, a lot of frost, and the general living conditions would have been terrible.
There was lots of opportunity for each side to communicate with the other.
And this was a regular thing which happened right from the start of trench warfare.
But communication would...
Often be in the form of soldiers from one side shouting over insults to those in the other trenches.
But what was interesting at Christmas is that both sides actually started to communicate in more friendly terms.
It really began with the Germans singing Christmas carols and setting up Christmas trees on top of their parapets.
And so they came to very much empathise with one another.
I remember very well Christmas.
I remember the Christmas day when the German and the French soldiers left their trenches, went to the barbed wire between them with champagne and cigarettes in their hands and had feelings of fraternization and shouted they wanted to finish the war.
And that lasted only two days, one and a half really.
And then strict order came that no fraternation was allowed and we had to stay back in our trenches.
And we shared fags, goodies with the Germans.
And then from somewhere, somehow, this football appeared.
Was it a proper football?
It was a proper football.
But we didn't form a team.
It wasn't a team game in any sense of the word.
You know, it was a kicker there.
Everybody was having a go.
It came from their side.
It wasn't from our side where the ball came.
How many people were taking part, do you think?
Well I should think there'd be at least a couple of hundred.
Did you pick the ball?
Oh yes I'd have got it.
I was pretty good then at 19. But while some parts of the front line were playing football and swapping stories, others were confused by what they heard or felt no inclination to socialise with those they had so recently been fighting.
After a few moments, there were lighted objects raised above the German parapet.
The Germans were shouting over: To our trench.
There's no doubt about that at all.
And before we could take any action or do anything, we were ordered to open rapid fire, you see, which we did.
The Germans did not reply to our rapid fire.
They simply carried on with their celebrations and were having a very fine time indeed.
They certainly were not going to do it anymore.
They thought that we were idiots, I suppose.
We were.
We're not us, but the command, you see.
The way that trench warfare was organised in the First World War, each sector was very distinctive and so you wouldn't necessarily know what was happening in the sector next door to you.
And you do get stories of one area of the front where they're experiencing a truce, but then suddenly they get fired on by the troops in the next sector who don't realise what's happening.
My father was delighted to have a letter giving such a description of events, and he sent them up to the Daily Telegraph.
I got into a flight for a rocket.
It showed up that it must have been me who wrote it, and he, Mossy, gave me an awful dressing gown for daring to write to the press.
Well, of course, I didn't.
My old man wrote to the press.
At the beginning of January 1915, the newspapers suddenly start printing these letters, and...
To begin with there was a certain amount of disbelief but then over time suddenly photographs started to appear as well and by that time the evidence was clear that this did happen.
It wasn't a myth and the media at the time Absolutely loved it.
There were lots of discussions in the newspapers about whether this was a good thing or a bad thing.
And, you know, in a way, it's a wonderful snapshot of Christmas 1914 when Attitudes was still slightly naive because the war had only really just begun.
You find that in 1915 and onwards, the war becomes...
Almost a much more serious endeavour.
You never get anything like the Christmas Truce happening again.
And over time, not only is it seen as an anomaly, but almost as a myth.
And it gets to the point where people are actually doubting whether it happened in the first place, which continues, you know, right up to this day.
So there's still a lot of confusion about whether there was a football match played and things like this.
The Christmas truce was unique, and nothing like it happened again to that scale.
And the reasons for this have varied.
Immediately after the truce, the high command of both sides stepped in to make sure that fraternisation and ceasefires like this would not happen in the same way.
But also, in the long term, the real reason that truces like this didn't happen is that the war changed in the way in which it was being fought.
As the war progressed, there's a more centralised method of command.
Those in the front line would have been forced into constant aggression.
You would have had artillery and trench mortar units constantly going.
And also, of course, as the war progressed, it took a far nastier turn.
So you get things like gas warfare introduced, an increasing number of civilian casualties.
You also get incidents like sinking of the Lusitania.
The temptation, I suppose, to empathise with the enemy and the desire to fraternise with them changed dramatically from 1915 onwards.
As Christmas Day draws to a close, the men shake hands for the last time and head back to their own trenches.
They know the significance of what's just occurred.
Even as I write, I can scarcely credit what I have seen and done.
This has indeed been a wonderful day.
Today we have peace.
Tomorrow you fight for your country, I fight for mine.
Good luck.
I left our friends on Christmas Day in a quiet mood.
I stood upon the parapet and had a final look around, and not a shot was fired.
One of the officers, a captain, clasps his hand together and looked towards heaven and said, My God, why cannot we have peace and let us all go home?
The following few days see a gradual return to war.
The ending of the truce is a bit like the start.
It starts in many different ways across the line.
And the ending, it finishes in many different ways at different times.
So for some, it's just Christmas Day.
And that's it.
Next day they're back to shooting.
For some it lasts almost a week.
It's amazing.
How does it end?
Well it ends in many different ways.
You get a new battalion come into the line.
Remember the British are changing over all the time.
New battalion arrives.
We're not having any of this truce.
Open fire.
Well that ends the truce quick enough.
Sometimes it's the guns.
The Royal Artillery.
Or the German Artillery.
They're not in a truce, and they open fire, and that ends the truce.
There's a myriad of different ways it ends, but it ends everywhere.
When it comes to it, those people that they met in No Man's Land, that they were photographed with, that they shook hands with, that they played football with, those people, within a matter of days, they were willing to shoot at, to put a bullet through their brain, to ban it if it came to it.
And that is the real...
Human nature, that's, if you like, the blackness of the human spirit.
You could see a man, you could shake hands with him, smoke his cigar, and you're perfectly willing to kill them.
And yet, many who were there did report feeling something special.
A brief interlude of peace that we remember to this day.
The whole thing is extraordinary that men were all so natural and friendly.
The Germans have no bitter feelings towards us.
It was a Christmas celebration in keeping with the command peace on earth and a memory which will stay with us always.
Alright, well that's about all the time we have this week.
Radio Free Northwest is brought to you by the Northwest Front.
You can reach the party on our website at northwestfront.info If you have any questions or comments that you'd like to have addressed on air, feel free to drop us an email at RadioFreeNorthwest at ProtonMail.com We'll talk to you again next week, and until then, Hail Victory, Comrades!
Oh, Tannenbaum!
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