A Time To Lay Down Arms
Ξ December 25th, 2008 | → 0 Comments | ∇ Uncategorized |
Donna writes:
One of my great joys in life is studying about wine. This year I’ve not been able to spend much time with my books and this week things slowed up for me and I took out one of the untouched dozens of volumes purchased this past year with good intentions to study.
Today I picked up “Champagne, How the Worlds Most Glamorous Wine Triumphed over War and Hard Times”, by Don & Petie Kladstrup. I was thumbing through the pages and my eye was caught by a brief description of how fighting stopped between the Allied and Germans on December 24, 1914. This really intrigued me and I started doing more research on the internet and military books I have at the house.
It was 5 months into WWI and already half a million had been killed in the fighting. Champagne’s fields were carved up vast trenches housing Allied and German soldiers, fighting for position to push each other back into retreat. The fields surrounding them held the bodies those that had fallen.
On evening of the 24th of December, Allied soldiers saw lights glowing from their enemy’s trenches. Then they hear Christmas carols being sung in German. With great hesitation, they began singing carols back and the book said a German soldier appeared through the mist holding a very small decorated Christmas tree and was unarmed.
The Allied soldiers left their weapons in the trenches and went to meet the German soldier, the Germans in their trenches also joined. They shook hands, embraced helped each other bring their dead back from the fields and drank Champagne, toasting each other to the early morning hours when at the days light a football (soccer) game was played.
After this wonderful evening of friendship and fun, the soldiers retreated back to their trenches and the fighting and death began again.
I can’t imagine the trust and bravery of those soldiers to lay down their weapons for a few hours and push aside their prejudice for a brief moment to be good to each other.
It’s remarkable how the holidays, in spite of our beliefs encourage us to reach out to each other and share the joy of these special days with each other.
This story gave me so much hope during this time of war and destruction. I encourage you all to lay down your arms, be brave, and trust yourself to reach out to your enemy and share wine and hope for the future, if only for a few hours.
Donna
