The sound echoed eerily across the frozen waste they called No Man’s Land.
‘They’re singing,’ Tom whispered to the man standing beside him in the trench.
‘In German,’ Joe whispered back. ‘The Hun is singing Silent Night.’
‘How d’you know that?’
‘I know the tune. We sing it in church at home.’
‘I’ve never heard it before.’
The two men were quiet now, listening to the deep, melodious voices. And their own thoughts turned to those at home. Mary would be helping their three children hang up their stockings near the fireplace, Tom thought. Then they would kiss the picture of him, each one in turn – she had told him this in her last letter before climbing the stairs and snuggling down in bed. Then she would fill their stockings with whatever little gifts she had been able to afford, no doubt shedding a tear because he wasn’t there to help her. Tom swallowed the lump that rose in his throat. He hoped she’d remember to put a shiny new penny in the toe of each stocking.
‘I’ve hidden them in my drawer,’ he’d told her. ‘Don’t forget now.’ They’d been the last words he’d said to her before he’d marched away, a proud volunteer to take the King’s Shilling and fight for his country.
Joe was thinking of his widowed mother. His three younger brothers were itching to follow his example and enlist. But Joe wasn’t sure it was a good idea, not now he had seen the conditions out here. If they should all be killed, their mother would have no one. After Christmas, he promised himself – the Christmas by which everyone had believed the war would be over – he would write to each one and warn them . . .
‘They can sing. I’ll give ’em that,’ Tom murmured. Cautiously, he started to stand up, to look above the parapet, just to see . . .
Joe grabbed his arm and pulled him back. ‘Keep down, you fool. It’ll be a trap.’
Now they could hear others close by, in their own trench, whispering. The hymn came to an end and the silence was even more unnerving than the singing had been. And then, spontaneous applause broke out in the British trenches with cries of ‘Bravo’ and ‘Happy Christmas’.
Rising above the noise and the laughter, they heard a German shouting, ‘Tommy? Tommy? Can you hear me, Tommy? Happy Christmas, Tommy.’
‘He knows my name!’ Tom’s voice rose in panic. ‘How’s he know my name?’
‘He doesn’t, you idiot,’ Joe laughed. ‘It’s what the Hun call us. We’re “Tommies” to them, just like they’re “The Hun” to us.’
‘Yeah, but we can’t shout that to him. Not if he’s trying to be friendly. It’s an insult.’
‘Friendly? More likely he wants to shoot your head off the minute you pop up above the parapet.’
‘I thought we called ’em “Fritz”.’
‘Well – yes – that too.’
‘That’s not rude, is it?’
‘I don’t suppose so, no.’
Tentatively, Tom lifted his head. ‘What do you want, Fritz?’
‘Ha! You are there!’
‘Of course we’re here,’ Tom muttered. ‘Where does he think we are? We’re here and they’re there – more’s the pity.’
This wasn’t the glorious war Tom had envisaged when he’d marched away with the cheers of the townsfolk ringing in his ears and urging him on. He was cold and hungry and his feet never seemed to be dry. There was the constant fear of being shot or blown to smithereens, to say nothing of sharing his dugout with catsized rats. And yet, he’d made some good pals. Joe, here beside him, for one. But now, it seemed, someone from the other side wanted to be friendly.
‘I have present for you, Tommy.’ The German was shouting again.
‘I bet he has,’Joe muttered morosely. ‘A bullet through the head, most likely. Throw him one of your jam-tin grenades, Tom.’
Tom was poking his head cautiously above the parapet again. Then he ducked down quickly. ‘He’s walking towards us carrying some sort of light.’ There was a pause whilst Tom took another quick peek. ‘There’s loads of ’em climbing out of their trench and coming towards us.’
‘Are they all carrying lights?’
‘No, but I can see their shapes.’ More voices filled the night air, German and British mingling in mutual greeting.
There was movement in their own trench now and, glancing to their left, the two men saw that some of their compatriots were climbing the ladders and going over the top of the parapet. But it wasn’t the usual ‘over the top’ order signalled by a whistle when the soldiers launched themselves, guns at the ready, towards No Man’s Land and on, through a hail of bullets, towards the enemy trenches.
‘Look! Just look. Some of our lads are going to meet them,’ Tom said.
‘Idiots! They’ll get killed – or court-martialled. Have they forgotten the order that came down the lines only yesterday? No fraternizing with the enemy, it said. The top brass must have been expecting something like this to happen.’
‘Joe – he’s here – the one with the light,’ Tom whispered urgently. ‘He’s standing right above us.’
They both looked up to see the grinning German soldier in his heavy trench coat and spiked helmet, standing on the parapet of the British trench and holding a small Christmas tree with six tiny flickering candles. He was a big man, tall and broad-shouldered, and he had a thick, curving moustache.
‘I bring you gift for Christmas, Tommy,’ the German said in thick, guttural English. ‘Ha-ha.’ He laughed raucously, the sound carrying through the darkness. ‘We are not going to fight you tomorrow. We play games together. Football, yes? My friend, he has a football.’
‘Is he serious?’ Joe muttered. ‘Who the heck brings a football to war with ’em?’
‘Evidently, a German.’
All along the British trench now, soldiers were climbing out to meet the men whom only a few hours earlier they had been trying to kill. Making a sudden decision, Tom grasped the ladder, put his foot on the bottom rung and heaved himself up, leaving his gun leaning against the wall of the trench, not wanted or needed in this strange, impromptu truce. With a shrug of resignation, Joe followed him and as they climbed out of their trench, very slowly and a little fearfully, a wondrous sight met their eyes. As far as they could see in both directions, small, candlelit Christmas trees were set on top of the German parapets, flickering and glinting on the frosty earth. The two men stood for a moment, staring about them as soldiers from both sides appeared, like rabbits from a warren, and walked towards one another.
Tom turned and held out his hand to the German. ‘How do you do, Fritz?’ he murmured, prompting another bark of laughter from the stranger.
‘My name is Kurt – Kurt Schulze.’
‘And mine’s Tom Benson.’
‘Ha – you really are “Tommy”.’
The German grasped Tom’s hand in a warm, firm handshake and the Englishman winced. ‘By heck, he’s got a grip of iron,’ he muttered. ‘I wouldn’t like that round my throat. I wonder if he’s learned unarmed combat, an’ all.’
‘I expect so,’Joe murmured.
‘Yes – yes, I am,’ Tom said, loudly, ‘and this is Joe.’
The introductions made, the three men stood awkwardly for a moment, unsure how to strike up a real conversation, until the German thrust the little Christmas tree into Tom’s hand. ‘There, you take. Put it in your trench when you eat your turkey. Ha-ha.’
‘Fat chance of such luxury,’ Joe said, but his initial reluctance was thawing a little now; this German seemed genuine, and beside them, all along the line, soldiers from opposite sides were laughing and talking together, offering each other cigarettes and chocolate.
Joe and Tom had arrived only recently in the front line, just west of Ploegsteert Wood, which the Tommies soon nicknamed ‘Plugstreet Wood’. They were among the first of Kitchener’s volunteers to replace the battle-weary and, by this time, the much-depleted British Expeditionary Force’s battalions. They hadn’t seen the battle at Mons, where the British had been forced to retreat, losing a lot of the ground they had occupied, or the fighting near the river Marne, which had been more successful for their side. They hadn’t been there in the middle of September when both the French and the British Commanders had given the order to their troops to entrench. Deep, winding trenches had been dug and were still being dug when Tom and Joe arrived.
‘I didn’t know this is what we’d have to do,’ Joe had grumbled, as he’d tried to deepen the already waterlogged trench. ‘Looks like we should be issued with spades, not rifles.’
‘Keep your head down, mate, and stop moaning,’ Tom had warned. He was relieved that there was no shelling at that time, though they had to be careful of snipers. Already they had seen one of their comrades killed by a single shot as he’d stood up to ease his aching back.
‘I wonder what he’s like,’ Tom had mused as they worked side by side.
‘Who?’
‘The Hun. I mean, is he really the barbarian the papers have been making out?’
‘I wouldn’t think so for a minute. He’ll be much the same as us, I shouldn’t wonder. He’ll have parents and wives, mebbe children even. He just speaks a different language, that’s all.’
‘But they hate us, don’t they?’
‘So the papers say, but isn’t it what they call “propaganda”?
‘What’s that?’
‘Stories put about deliberately to make us hate the enemy.’ Joe seemed a little more knowledgeable than Tom. ‘Mind you, he does look a bit of a comic figure strutting about in his spiked helmet.’
‘Mebbe we look as daft in our puttees.’
‘Aye, and a fat lot of good they are against this mud.’
Three days before Christmas, the rain had stopped and the trenches began to dry out a little, but then came snow.
‘This’ll be worse still,’ Joe had groaned. ‘What we need is a good, hard frost.’
Joe got his wish on Christmas Eve. The digging in their section stopped as hard ground replaced the squelching mud. ‘Someone’s got a guardian angel up there looking out for us,’ Tom laughed. ‘This is a welcome Christmas present: no digging. And it’s a beautiful winter’s day. Just look at the frost coating everything, Joe, sparkling in the sunshine. I couldn’t have decorated the landscape better than Nature has done.’
‘That’s all very well, Tom, but it’s good sniping weather. I’d sooner have a bit of fog.’
And now Tom and Joe were standing close to a real, live Hun. But he didn’t look like a barbarian. He looked rather jovial and friendly, Tom thought as he stretched out his hand to receive the lit-up Christmas tree. ‘Thanks, Fritz – I mean, Kurt.’ Suddenly, the enemy had a human face, a name; now he was a real person to the British Tommy.
‘Wait, I have a present for you.’ Tom turned and retreated down the ladder into his own trench, carrying the little tree, the candles flickering and threatening to go out, but he carried it carefully, anxious not to let the German think he didn’t value the gift. He set it on top of their own parapet and then hurried to the dugout he and Joe used and returned to the ladder holding the Christmas pudding Mary had sent.
‘It is from my wife,’ Tom told him as he handed it to Kurt. ‘She made it herself.’
‘Ah, that is a wonderful gift. I will share it with my friend, yes?’
Tom nodded, still watching the German closely. They had been warned by their superiors to be extra vigilant at Christmas. ‘The enemy may attack us when he thinks we are relaxed and celebrating.’
Was all this still a devious trap? Tom was thinking even as he handed over the present. But Kurt was clutching it to his chest as if it was the most precious thing he had ever been given. ‘Tomorrow, I bring you beer.’
‘Beer?’ Tom and Joe replied together in surprise.
‘Ha – yes. There is brewery behind the line. You haven’t bombed it yet. Ha-ha.’ His laughter echoed once again through the frosty night air.
The two Englishmen smiled at each other. Real beer; they couldn’t wait.
‘I go back now,’ Kurt said, ‘but I see you tomorrow. I bring my friend and we play football, yes?’
Tom and Joe watched him all the way back to his own trench and only when Kurt had disappeared below the German parapet did they turn and climb back down their own ladder. All along the line, the British soldiers, returning to their dugouts, were marvelling at what had happened.
‘Look what one of ’em’s given me.’ A youth, barely older than sixteen, held several cigarettes in the palm of his hand. ‘I felt bad, because I hadn’t anything to give him.’
‘Ne’er mind, mate. Tomorrow you can give him some of those sweets your mam sent you. That’s if you haven’t eaten them all by now,’ replied Tom.
‘D’you think they’ll come back tomorrow?’
‘I hope so,’ Joe said. ‘That chap we were talking to’s promised to bring us a barrel of beer.’ Joe’s change of heart had been sudden and complete.
For the next hour, singing sounded from both trenches. First the British gave a hearty rendition of ‘It’s a long way to Tipperary’ and then the Germans sang one of their favourite songs. Both sides ended the night as if in tacit agreement by singing the same carol, ‘Oh Come All Ye Faithful’, together but in different languages.
As the singing died away and both sides applauded each other, the night ended with shouts of ‘Happy Christmas, Englander’ and ‘See you tomorrow, Fritz’. Tom and Joe turned to their sandbagged dugout.
‘Did all that really happen?’ Joe said, shaking his head in disbelief. ‘I reckon I’ve been dreaming.’
‘Takes some believing,’ Tom agreed, as they settled down to try to get a little sleep in the bitter cold of their shelter. ‘We’ll see what tomorrow brings, eh?’
‘Aye,’ Joe said, some of his pessimism returning. ‘Mebbe they’ll be shooting at us again by then.’
The following morning, after breakfast and prayers, Tom and Joe heard Kurt’s loud voice. ‘Hey Tommy, are you there?’ This time, Joe did not chide Tom when he poked his head above the parapet.
‘Happy Christmas, Kurt.’
‘Ha! Happy Christmas, Tommy. We play football, yes? I have the ball.’
‘Righto,’ Tom called back and he and Joe climbed out of the trench. Along both the trenches more men climbed out, and soon there was a football match in progress. More and more soldiers lined the edges of No Man’s Land watching and cheering on their own side.
‘It’s a pity, y’know,’ Joe said, as they returned to their trench after the match, breathless yet exhilarated even though the Germans had been victorious with a score of three to two, ‘that this whole shenanigans can’t be settled on a football pitch.’
Tom laughed wryly. ‘But they won, Joe. We can’t have that.’
‘Aye, and they might win the war, an’ all,’ Joe muttered morosely.
‘Aw, mate, don’t let anyone else hear you talking like that. You could be put up against a wall and shot by our own side. Anyway, guess what? Kurt was telling me he’s a barber by trade. He’s going to cut my hair this afternoon.’
‘Really? I could do with a trim myself.’
Later that day, Kurt had a queue for his makeshift barber’s shop, set up in the middle of No Man’s Land. Someone from the German side had produced a chair and Kurt brandished his scissors with relish. ‘I brought the tools of my trade to war with me,’ he said. ‘I would never go anywhere without them.’
‘What’s he charging?’ Joe asked as they stood in line.
‘Five fags or an ounce of baccy,’ Tom replied promptly as they watched the professional at work. ‘And just look at him – that’s the best haircut I’ve seen since I left home. Not like the army barbers, is he?’
‘Call them barbers? I’ve seen a better job done by a sheep shearer,’ Joe muttered scathingly. ‘The one that did me when I volunteered nearly had me ear off.’
‘You know, when I write and tell Mary about this, she’ll never believe me.’
‘None of ’em will back home. We’re here to win a war, not be playing footer and having our hair cut in the middle of No Man’s Land by the enemy.’
Tom glanced around him at the groups of soldiers, listening to the laughter and chatter as they drank beer from the barrels which the Germans had rolled across that morning, and watching as the men from both sides exchanged small gifts. Someone was playing a penny whistle – and a group of soldiers were singing, each side trying to teach the other their favourite songs amidst much hilarity at the mangling of their respective languages.
When the queue for Kurt’s ministrations had all gone and there was only Tom left to do, the Englishman pulled a photograph out of his pocket as he sat down in the chair. ‘This is my Mary, Kurt, and my three children.’
The German took the picture and stared down at it for a long time before handing it back to Tom. There were tears in the big man’s eyes. ‘You have a wonderful family, Tommy. I hope you live to get back to them. Now, sir, how would you like your hair cut today?’
‘Short back and sides, my man, if you please.’ And the two men laughed together.
As night fell on the strange Christmas Day, the two sides parted company with much backslapping and promises to meet again in the morning. On Boxing Day, they might be able to repeat the camaraderie of today, but after that . . .
‘Kurt – I have a gift for you. Wait a moment . . .’
Tom hurried back to the British trench, climbed down the ladder and stumbled to the dugout he shared with Joe. Amongst his possessions he found what he was looking for. Returning to the waiting German he said, ‘I want you to have this. It’s what Princess Mary has sent to every soldier. She’s the daughter of our King, you know.’
He held out the metal box with the Princess’s likeness and the date ‘Christmas 1914’ stamped on the lid. Almost reverently, Kurt opened it. Inside was a packet of cigarettes, a pipe and tobacco and a card which read, ‘With Best Wishes for a Happy Christmas and a Victorious New Year, From The Princess Mary and Friends at Home’.
Kurt gave a bark of laughter as he handed the card back to Tom. ‘I think she means this for you, but I will accept the gift gratefully. Thank you, my friend.’ Clutching the box, he turned away abruptly and called back over his shoulder, ‘I will see you tomorrow.’
‘That was a bit sudden, wasn’t it?’ Joe said, staring after the figure disappearing into the gloom.
‘Aye, it was, but didn’t you notice?’
‘Notice what?’
‘I reckon he had tears in his eyes.’
‘Don’t be daft,’ Joe scoffed. ‘A big German like that getting soppy over a few ciggies and a bit of baccy. Come on, let’s get back and see what muck they’ve cooked up for us tonight.’
But their main meal that Christmas Day was a feast. Parcels from home had been opened and shared and there was tinned turkey, Christmas pudding and rich fruitcake, to say nothing of biscuits and sweets, for everyone.
Once again, the sound of singing from both trenches filled the darkness, yet tonight there was a more sombre note to their voices and Tom felt tears fill his own eyes as he thought about Mary and his children and wondered what they were doing at this moment. Never mind what Joe said, Tom was sure he’d seen tears in the big German’s eyes too.
Kurt was at the top of their ladder early the next morning. ‘Tommy, Tommy, I have a gift for you. Come out here.’
Tom emerged from the dugout to see the big German standing on the edge of the parapet beckoning him. He climbed up and stood beside him as Kurt thrust a small, flat silver cigarette case into his hand. ‘I want you to have this.’
‘Oh Kurt, I couldn’t, mate.’ He looked down at it, turning it over in his hands. ‘You can’t give me this. It’s far too expensive. Besides, it’s got your initials engraved on it.’
‘So,’ Kurt grinned. ‘It is mine to give, yes?’
‘Well – I suppose so.’
‘You will always remember me.’
‘Of course I will.’
‘And now we play footer again and we beat you again, yes?’
‘Uh-oh, not this time, big feller.’ Tom shook his head as he slipped the cigarette case into the breast pocket of his jacket. ‘This time we win, yes? Joe – round up the lads, we’ve got a return match . . .’
As darkness gathered, an air of sadness settled over the soldiers on both sides of the barbed wire. They all knew – British soldiers and Germans alike – that the brief period of fraternization was over. The killing would have to begin again. But it would be hard to fire their guns knowing that they were perhaps killing the very man with whom only hours before they’d shared a mug of beer, or smoked a cigarette or shown their precious photographs. It would be heartbreaking to hear the shells fired and see earth blown high into the air, taking bodies with it. On both sides, there would be regret.
Tom was reluctant to fire a shot, but he knew if he was caught aiming into the air or refusing to go ‘over the top’ he would face a court martial and would probably be shot for cowardice, desertion or both. So, he had no choice. After a sprinkling of snow on Boxing Day that turned to sleet and then to rain, the trenches and surrounding areas were soon back to their muddy, waterlogged state. The daily battle with the cold and wet was uppermost in all their minds. Tom and Joe were amongst those relieved from their duties at the front and they returned to their billets behind the lines for rest and recuperation. But the whisper amongst the soldiers was that the ‘truce’ seemed to be lingering. Both sets of opponents seemed reluctant to fire on their new-found friends, no doubt with the strong disapproval of the ‘top brass’ on each side. There was little real fighting until the middle of March when Tom and Joe found themselves back in the thick of a battle near Neuve Chappelle. Memories of the Christmas festivities faded and the war was once again a cruel reality. Yet Tom still carried the silver cigarette case in his breast pocket. Side by side, he and Joe obeyed the commands of their superiors; daily they carried out their duties, longing for rest, yearning for it all to be over, praying that they would not get killed . . .
Tom wasn’t expecting it when a lone sniper’s bullet hit him, swiftly followed by another. He felt the thud against the left-hand side of his chest that knocked the wind from him. He put up his hand to the place and the second shot penetrated his hand and embedded itself in his shoulder. He fell back with a gasp, his only thought the unfinished letter to his beloved Mary.
‘Tom! Tom!’ He heard Joe’s frantic voice as the other man pulled him up out of the water in the bottom of the trench. And then, for Tom, everything went black.
He came to in a field hospital just behind their lines and Joe was still with him, talking to him, crying and laughing all in the same breath. ‘You lucky so-and-so, Tom Benson. You’ve got a Blighty wound. You’re going home. The bullet that would have killed you, hit that cigarette case in your pocket. Old Kurt saved your life, mate.’
Tom Benson returned to Mary and his children and for the rest of his life he carried the silver cigarette case in his breast pocket. From time to time, he would take it out, turn it over and over in his hands and trace with his finger the dent between the K and the S that the bullet had made. And he never tired of telling his children and his grandchildren the story of how a simple gift from an enemy soldier in the middle of a terrible war had given him the rest of his life.