Profs and Pints Online presents: “The Christmas Truce of 1914,” an examination of an extraordinary silent night in World War I, with Simon Jones, a historian and battlefield guide who has written books about the war and taught courses on it at Liverpool and Leicester Universities.

[This talk will remain available in recorded form at the link given here for tickets and access.]

At Christmas 1914, hundreds of British and German soldiers on the Western Front in Belgium and France left their trenches, walked into No Man’s Land, and shook hands. For days, the opposing sides barely fired a shot, helped to bury one another’s dead, and even played soccer together.

For those taking part, the truce seemed unbelievable. Others serving at the front elsewhere even doubted that it possibly could have occurred. But, as over a hundred eyewitness accounts prove, there was not one truce but many. Moreover, fraternization and temporary cessations of hostilities were not confined to British-held sectors but also took place between French and German troops.

It is not difficult to understand why the truce continues to capture the imagination. In the midst of inhumanity, the soldiers, inspired by the spirit of Christmas, spontaneously stopped fighting, seeming to exemplify the futility of conflict.

In the popular interpretation the men in the trenches, in defiance of commanders and politicians safely behind the lines, refused to hate their enemies and had no wish to fight them. But how accurate is this characterization? And why is the truce believed to give a truer picture of the war than any other episode in the four years of remorseless and brutal struggle?

Simon Jones will unravel the myths and explain what really happened. He’ll talk about how we can understand this remarkable event, and what it means for the present day.

Profs & Pints Online: The Christmas Truce of 1914