text: As long as I shall live, till the day that my beard is long and grey and my eyes have grown dim with time, I will never forget the day that the thunder stopped. It had been five months since we had dug the trenches and hunkered down to defend ourselves against the Germans. We didn’t expect to have to hunker down for such a defense, as when we came from across the English Channel to deal with the Central Powers we had been told that the war would be a quick one. All that we had to do was show Germany that we would not take their attacks against France lying down, kick them back into their borders, and everything would be over. We would be home in front of the fire regaling others with tales of our heroism my Christmas morning. But no. As the days turned to weeks and the weeks turned into months, we found ourselves being stuck in the trenches as we waited for the war to end. Then the storm began, and the thunder would echo across no-mans land. The storm took many forms across each day, varying in how hard it would hit us in the trenches. Some days the storm would be just the ever present thunder of cannon fire from both our and the German’s artillery. Some days the storm would be the blinding flashes of lightning from German and British rifles along with the cracks of thunder and the screams of men. But the worst days, the days that everyone feared, the days that you wish you could go home and hide in the covers to wait out the storm were the days where the thunder came from the stomping of men’s boots in the mud. It didn’t matter if it was the boots of the Germans or our own boots, it all meant the same thing. It meant that someone was trying to bring an end to the war by taking the opposing trenches through a tactical charge and a storm of violence, only to inevitably fail. It was those days that you would hear the endless fire of machine guns cutting down charging soldiers, the loud terrifying cracks of sniper rifles trying to pick off anyone of importance, the screams of both Germans and Englishmen as they would tear each other down all for the sake of a few dozen or so yards. Then, when the attackers retreated to lick their wounds and you would think the storm would stop, a commander would always demand a counter attack. After all, they were weakened and we beat them back, surely we can take the trench this time. Only it never worked. The thunder would reign across no-mans land as the storm took countless lives from both us and the krauts, only to result in no change. We would still be in our trenches, and the Germans still in theirs. We would sleep, knowing that tomorrow the storm would begin again. This is simply how life was in the trenches. Sometimes you would have a brief moment of respite. Sometime you would get to go back to France for some well deserved R&R to try and get back what little sanity you had left. Some men would get lucky and take a bullet in the arm or leg and be sent to an aid station. If they were really lucky, they would then be sent home with all four limbs. There were many who were less lucky who went home with an empty sleeve, or left one of their boots behind with the army. But at least they went home. I can still remember the faces of many people who took a bullet and were sent home in a box. If they could find their remains at all. And yet despite all this, despite the screams of pain and cries of death and pleads to God that this bloody war would end, it refused. The storm would never stop, never tire, never rest until one of the trenches was empty of living souls. Even in the harshest of climates would it continue. You would hear the thunder of cannons try to out shine the thunder in the sky, with the lightning of God himself occasionally illuminating no-man’s land so you could see the endless muddy fields filled with barbed wire and rotting bodies. When it grew cold, you had to be careful of patches of ice in the trenches. I heard one too many tales of men not keeping an eye on where they were walking only to slip and impale themselves on their own bayonets. And so the storm pressed on. Day or night, rain or shine, holiday or not, it did not matter. The storm pressed on, trying with all it’s might to kill all the men who found themselves deployed into hell itself. The endless war made the days start to meld into one another. I recall once asking what day it was, thinking that October was only around the corner only to learn it was November 12th. And in what felt like a single blink of an eye, I was later informed by one of my fellow soldier that Christmas was right around the corner. Christmas. A day a reverence, a day that should have been spent with family and friends was now to be spent in the mud and snow filled trenches with a gun in hand and the sound of thunder ever present. We should have been without any hope and miserable that we would be spending this most holy of holidays fighting a war that no one wanted to fight. And yet... as we sat there in the trench on Christmas eve, we could hear something from across no-man’s land. It was faint, almost too faint to make out what exactly was being sung. But after a moment or two of listening close, as the thunder of cannons came to a rest, we could hear the faint sounds of singing coming from the German side. “Stille Nacht, heilige Nact... Alles schlaft... einsam wacht...” I did not and still cannot understand German, aside from a couple of phrases that have managed to stick in my head. Yet the melody was one we all knew, one that had been playing in our heads for the past week. The krauts were singing Silent Night. “’Round yon virgin Mother and Child... Holy infant so tender and mild.” I couldn’t help it, nor could many of the men with me. As we heard our sworn enemies sing the carol, we began to join in. Men who had spent the last several months getting bombarded with shells and bullets in a storm of violence that never ended were now just... singing. Sitting in trenches in the cold and mud just... singing carols with the enemy. “Sleep in himmlischar Ruuuuuuuuuuh! Schlaf in heavenly peace...” After a few verses of this, I could feel sleep overtake me, with the last thing I remember being the sounds of holy carols echoing across the storm scarred landscape. The next morning I awoke to the feeling of snowflakes on my nose. It had begun snowing overnight, with a light powder having already built up across the bottom of the trenches. When I was a lad, waking up to a white Christmas would have been a joyous occasion. I could look forward to opening my presents alongside my brother and sister before taking our sled out and racing the family dog down the hills behind our house. Now, however, I knew the snow would only make the storm colder and harsher. I knew that, in time, I would be running through slush and muck trying to stop the German advance. After a moment or two though, I realized something. Every day previously I would be awakened to the sound of the thunder, with each sides artillery trying to catch the enemy by surprise. Many a fresh face recruit had been lost to a rouge shell from the Germans if they didn’t find a good spot to sleep in the night before. Yet this day... I woke up to snow and silence. No thunderous bootsteps, no echoing artillery, no cracks of rifles and screams of dying men. Just... silence. Silence and lightly falling snow. It was... peaceful. Quiet. Tranquil. Almost enough to make you forget about the impeding storm. “ENEMY APPROACHING!” I heard someone shout, and instinctively I shot to my feet and aimed my rifle down no-man’s land. I knew it couldn’t last, the peace and tranquility. The storm had to return, as it always did. I looked down the sights of my rifle to see a lone man who had emerged from the trenches. But... strangely enough he was not charging at is with bloodthirst and hate in his eyes. No... instead he looked scared, like a stray dog approaching a man for scraps of food. He wore no helmet, carried no rifle, he didn’t even have a knife or grenade on his person. What was approaching us was not a soldier. It was a man who was scared and wanting something from us. “HOLD YOUR FIRE MEN!” Our commander shouted, an order we all obeyed. We all looked to each other, as if one of us had the answer. Who was this German? Why was he approaching us? Was this a trick? A secret ploy? Or was this... because it was Christmas? There was a corporal in my unit, a young fellow named George McClellan. The lad was one of the youngest in our unit, and had clearly lied about his age in order to come earn glory in war. In terms of a soldier, he wasn’t a very good one. He wasn’t a great shot, nor could he run that fast or throw a grenade with any sort of skill, but the lad was good company and quick to cheer you up. He had a sort of enthusiasm that was infectious, and always quick with a joke even in the direst of circumstances. To this day I still send his family a small portion of my paycheck whenever I can. It’s the least I could do to try and help them after George was unable to fit his gas mask on properly a few days before he was supposed to be sent home. If George couldn’t be sent home, then at least I could send a bit of money to the grieving family. I remember watching as George looked up from his rifle’s sights, set his weapon down to lean against the trench and, even though the rest of us were asking if he knew what he was doing, George slowly emerged from the trenches and tossed his helmet down to the bottom of the trench. We watched with rapt attention as George slowly walked towards the German, both of their hands held high in the air before slowly they both lowered their arms and began to shake one another’s hands. It was that handshake that managed to break us all out of our stupors, both German and English. All of us slowly began to lower our weapons, climb out of the trenches, and cross the death field known as no-mans land to go great our brothers on this most holy of days. Christmas had come, and the storm had stopped. God bless us all. I too had joined my country men in making my way across the field to speak to our fellow men. I met a young man who seemed to be around my age. We were both young men, the ideal for the army, and both men who would be lucky to see the rest of our lives if the war continued. I shook his hand, and introduced myself to him. He told me his name was Hans Müller, and after a few minutes of talking we became the closest of chaps. We shared tales of our families back home, of our mothers and fathers who we missed so desperately. I showed him a small picture of my family, noting that he reminded me a lot of my little sister with his blonde hair and green eyes. He laughed, and told me I reminded him of his father who had come to fight in the war as well. His father was stationed at another unit on the eastern front, and he hoped that both he and his father would go home to Chemnitz. He showed me a picture of his girlfriend from back in Chemnitz, a lovely woman by the name of Anna. They had met shortly after starting high school together and had been near inseparable ever since then. He told me that every week he tries to write her a letter, and every week he almost cries in joy upon getting a letter back from her. I told him not of my girlfriend, as I did not have one at that time, but of a lovely nurse at our aid station who I always was sure to say hello to every chance I could get. I told him of her pretty smile, and her beautiful black hair, and the way her nose would crinkle every time I told her a joke and managed to make her laugh. Hans was quick to offer some good nature teasing about my little crush and told me that when the war was over that I should bring my nurse and myself to come meet him and Anna, that we would have the most lovely of holiday together. We had not noticed, but as we continued to talk we had begun to walk across no-mans land. We probably would have kept walking and talking for hours had it not been for Hans noticing something before breaking down into tears. I asked him what was wrong, and he pointed at a body that hung from some barbed wire. He told me through his tears that the lad was a friend of his who had gone missing a few days ago. My guess was that he had been trying to run back to the trenches, only to be shot down when he got stuck in the wire. I tried to apologize for what happened, to console my new friend, but the words he said to me were powerful enough to silence me. “Do not apologize, mein Freund. Even if you fired the shot, you were not the one that chose to send us both here, to put us against one another. I blame those who sent us here, and pray to God that someday soon they shall resolve their differences and send us home.” We did not speak for a while after that. Instead I returned to my trench, grabbed a shovel, and slowly helped my enemy dig a grave for the man that my fellow soldiers had killed. Over time both Germans and Englishmen came by, adding their dead to Hans’ friend as they helped dig a grave. At some point someone, I don’t know who, brought over a large wooden cross. We etched into it the date, December 25, 1914, and scratched in the initials off all those we knew would not make it home. We all stood there, German and English hand in hand, and said a prayer for those we would now miss. When we returned to the rest of the men, they had started to organize a football match between both sides. In desperate need for some joy after the grief we just shared, Hans and I were quick to join in. I remember the sounds of laughter, the cheers of men as we had the greatest fun any of us would ever remember. We laughed and sang and teased in good fun while playing, all of us brothers and friends. I don’t remember who won, but I am pretty sure that English skill won the day in our favor (and if Hans says any different, he is just trying to make himself look better after accidentally passing the ball to me). At some point one of the Germans had returned from his side of the war with a few spirits in hand, and we quickly sent one of our own boys to grab a bottle or two of the French wine that we had gotten not too long ago. We all knew the day would be best ended with drinks, in a toast to the happy day we shared and a hope for many more of them to come. We did not think about what tomorrow would bring. Instead, we poured each other a drink, sang carols in drunken English and German, and shared stories of Christmases past. I remember George running over, sporting a new haircut and a slightly slurred speech going on about how “one of the machine gunners from the German side used to be a barber. He’s offering haircuts to anyone who wants one, and all it costs is a fun story from home.” We laughed and asked him to share his story with us while we drank. He told us the story about the time he tried to get a cat out of a tree for a girl he liked, only for his suspenders to get caught on a loose branch causing him to be stuck in the tree too. This set us all into an uproar, and poor George was the subject of endless teasing for the weeks to come. He took it all in good stride though, and never seemed to hold any hate towards our joking manners. God, I miss the lad. As the eve creeped along, and Christmas came to an end, we all softly sang carols and prayed for a better future. We all knew that tomorrow the thunder would begin again. Tomorrow these men would be our enemies once again. Tomorrow our sights would point at the men we called brothers and we would be forced to kill our friends in the name of Queen and Country. But we chose to forget that. We chose to ignore those dark thoughts, for as the most holy of days continued we knew that we were not Germans or Englishmen. We were not Allied Forces or Soldiers of the Central Powers. No, instead we were friends. We were brothers. We were family. Tomorrow the thunder would start again. Tomorrow the terror would begin once more. But as I went to sleep that night after saying goodbye to my dear friend Hans, a new hope filled my dreams. A hope that one day the thunder would forever stop, and the storm would never start again.