A blogging acquaintance of mine who lives in Great Britain blogged the other day about a Christmas truce during World War I.
The Christmas truces are getting a lot of attention in Europe this December as they continue to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I. That was supposed to be the War that Ended all Wars. Obviously, they were wrong.
I was originally going to blog about Civil War Christmas truces, but almost every search I did brought me to the Christmas, 1914 WWI truces So, instead, I'd like to start with the modern American Santa Claus, which originated during our Civil War. Thomas Nast, whose cartoons of Santa Claus helped to shape what we think of as Santa Claus today, started his career as a Civil War illustrator.
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"Civil War Santa" at an upstate New York mall |
But then, I finally finally found some information about informal truces that had occurred during our American Civil War, and I found this amazing description from various historical records of truces and other incidents during Civil War Christmastime.
"Peace on Earth" - such an elusive goal for our human race, even as we are able to call temporary truces in the middle of a war. Will we ever achieve everlasting peace? My personal thought is - no. I hope I'm wrong.
Such a timely post - Peace on Earth is what we pray for --- I did hear about Christmas Truces - it is just so amazing that they could stoped and visit and go back to war - ugh...so sad and yet they brought in Christmas for some joy
ReplyDeleteI really love the Sainsbury advert, it's a favourite of mine!
ReplyDelete-I don't think we'll ever have a warless Christmas, nor will we achieve everlasting peace. It's sad, but probably true.
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Man being man, I agree with you. Men are used to being the one who defends the home. That is no longer necessary in peaceful countries, so man needs to use that driving agression in another way. If we could channel that drive, just think what we might achieve.
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