The Cordova daily times., 1915-01-30
ALL DIFFERENCES
BURIED FOR
A D Ay

teered for service with the British
army at the beginning of the war.
Although there was no formal
truce declared during the holiday sea.
son. the fighters here had several
days of quiet, by tacit consent.
Germans and Englishmen met on
the plain fields between the lines.
shook hands. swamped tobacco, told
stories. and were even planning an in
ternational football game when the
weather turned bad. All day long
there was searching for souvenirs
to send home and hundreds of frag-
ments of shells or broken equipment
were picked up in sections of the
field where ordinarily 1t would mean
sure death for a soldier to show him
self.
"All rife firing stopped at twi-
light on Christmas Eve. During the
evening both sides placed candles and
little bonflres as Christmas lights a.
long the top of the trenches. When
it was seen that neither side intend
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rary peace, the soldiers began to
climb out of their trenches. and took
up positions in the bright moonlight
on the fiat ground in front. Back
and forth across that two hundred
yard field they greeted each other
with wishes for a Merry Christmas.
There was much cheering, speechmak-
ing. singing carols, and little dane
ing. The Engllshmen sang Lead
Kindly Light, Abide With Me, and
While Shepherds Watched Their
Flocks by Night. The hymns were
interspersed with such favorites as
Mandelay and Tipperary.
Gradually few of the groups
from the two sides drifted closer to-
gether. Everybody was unarmed.
One of the foremost German groups
waved a bottle of wine toward the
nearest English groups and invited
them to join the party. After a mo
ment or two the Englishmen started
over, carrying n Christmas cade and
box of chocolates. The men shook
hands all around, and Immediately
cheers and clapping came from both
sides of the field, where English and
Germans alike had been anxiously
watching the meeting. The group
had a smoke and drink together, and
very soon large parties of the late
enemies were seen chatting together.
All the time in the distance could be
hard the sound of artillery firing.
"The Englishmen snapped pipe to-
bacco for German cigars, and British
candies for German chocolate. Lat
err in the evening the Germans sent
over to the British trenches a small
Christmas tree, with various cheer
full messages and little gifts tied to
It's branches.
ION Christmas day the British sol
diers brought football out in front
of the trenches and invited the Ger
mans to send a team over for a game
during the afternoon. They prom
Used to do this. but the weather-or
their ofticers-prevented it
Soldiers unslung their cameras
and took snapshots of the little groups
of men from both sides hob-nobbing
together, During the morning some
of the gayer spirits organized what
they called fantastic parade led by
German youth who had somehow OBJ
| tanned possession of high hat and a
dress suit Among the paraders were
two soldiers mounted on old bicycles
tires.
"The happy scene was rudely inter
rupted about / O'Clock In the after.
noon by the arrival of big shell
| fired from a battery several miles
/ in the rear, which sent everybody
scurrying back to the trenches for a
time.
Later in the afternoon British sol
diers helped the enemy bury ten Ger
man soldiers whose bodies were found
| in ditch In front of the German
trench They were killed a few
days ago in an attempt on the Eng
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