Truce In The Trenches

The Christmas Truce of 1914 was an official ceasefire not authorized by the superior command levels. It took place on December 24, 1914 and on subsequent days, at certain parts of the Western Front, and in particular between German and British soldiers in Flanders.

Whether or not any football games were played between the two sides is a matter of conjecture. According to Chris Baker, former chairman of the Western Front Association and author of a book on the truce, it is possible that a game of football was played between the first batallion of the Norfolk regiment and the Bavarian RIR 16, although no evidence of this exists from the German side. The RIR 16 was Felix Kiefer's regiment, but unfortunately Felix had been severely wounded in October 1914, had been sent to hospital in Hamburg and was spending December 1914 at home in Ettlingen to convalesce.


However, it seems likely that upon returning to his regiment in early 1915, Felix would have learned of a truce or a football match from his comrades, and relayed the information to his family. Unfortunately, we can find no reference to this in any of Felix's letters. Felix's brother Tor, also located at the Western Front during 1914, would have learned of it or even possibly experienced a truce at his own position. But Tor reports, in a letter dated November 17, 1916, of a special unofficial truce at the Eastern Front, where he was stationed, and writes, "As long as we have been at war, nothing like this has ever happened".

Tor's Letter

Tor's letter tells the extraordinary story of a period during November 1916 when, stationed at the Eastern Front near Najarowka, an unofficial ceasfire took place between the Germans and the Russians in order to allow each side to build their dugouts, collect wood and supplies, etc. At one point, several soldiers from each army met each other across a stream and conversed with each other. Finally, one of the Russian lieutenants sent a soldier with a handwritten note in German, asking for a ceasefire.

"A special peace is being made here", Tor writes. "That is, until the "friendly" communication with the Russians is forbidden by divisional command. But the silent treaty remains. Companies of Russians come down the mountain without any cover and can work on their positions. Vehicles that you could easily shoot down are driving by with wood supplies. As long as we have been at war, nothing like this has ever happened. To put it in a nutshell: there must be peace".


Ettlingen's newspapers of December 1914 make no mention of an actual truce, but they do report that the Front at Flanders has been relatively quiet over the Christmas period, and that the English requested a ceasefire to bury their dead, which was conceded.

The Badischer Landsmann
on December 28, 1914

Central Headquarters, December 25, morning. Peace generally prevailed yesterday in Flanders. East of Festubert, the English lost a further part of the position that had been captured on December 20.

At Chivy, our troops removed an enemy company that had settled down in front of our position. 17 French were captured. The enemy suffered further losses in an attempt to retake our position.

The situation in the East remained unchanged yesterday.

Central Headquarters, December 26, morning. At Nieuport, attacks by the English and the French during the night of 24th to 25th December were repelled.

The success of the battles at Festubert with Indians and English could be seen today. 19 officers and 819 Indians and English were taken prisoner today, 14 machine guns, 12 mortars, floodlights and other military material were captured. The enemy left over 3000 dead on the battlefield. A ceasefire requested by the English to bury their dead was conceded. Our losses were relatively low.

Famine And Revolution

Towards the end of the Great War, Germany's suffering intensified both in the field and at home. Families in the homeland were experiencing previously unknown famine and were unable to subsist on the ration cards. The only way to survive was to become self-supporting, or to hoard food, which was prohibited. Some stole from farmers' fields at night, only to be caught by police who were lying in wait to catch such thieves.

At the Front, it had become a situation of "every man for himself". Many were no longer obeying commands and the war had turned into a battle for individual survival.

The lone watch in the trench - photo sent by
Tor Kiefer from the Front to his family

Upon returning home at the end of the war, the soldiers found a revolution. The Kaiser had fled to Holland and the country was in the hands of workers' and military councils; the epaulettes and cockades of the returning men were torn off in the streets. Many soldiers who had not been fortunate enough to secure a job in the homeland stood before closed doors. Under the Treaty of Versailles of 1919, the Allied and Associated powers occupied Germany and many Germans were unable to find a place to live, being forced to move in with relatives or friends.



Tor Kiefer, who at age 29 had become the deputy senior physician of his regiment, wrote the poem "Die Heimat" describing this situation.

Tor also wrote the following report of the famine in the homeland and the battle for survival at the Front:
"The officers had their own supplies of food, and didn't suffer any shortages. They were able to buy everything they wanted from the canteen. Towards the end, things became scarcer and more sparse. The more the hope of a favorable end dwindled, and the longer the war lasted, the more each individual was only interested in his own survival.

Tor's report

Service at the Front was no longer an honorable one. In the back area, they were told "If you don't toe the line, you'll be sent to the Front!" Nobody came from the front or the rear. Each individual person acted only in their own private interests, without any regard for others, with just one aim - to get out safely.

To put themselves in a good light, the Generals organized a partial offensive on the occasion of the Crown Prince's birthday. Hundreds fell - but they delivered a report of success. The men in the trenches received sad letters from the homeland. Famine, until now unknown in Germany, plagued the families. They were not able to survive from the ration cards and what they received with them, and had to hoard food. Farmers demanded extraordinary prices for their products".

Prisoners on April 28, 1916 at the Eastern Front
Photo by Tor Kiefer

"But not everyone had Persian carpets, pianos, gold and silver", Tor continues. "The poor were simply fighting for their lives. They went out at night and dug out potatoes from farmers' fields, only to be caught by policemen who confiscated everything. You can only imagine their bitter anger, after all their trouble, to then return home empty-handed to a starving family. How does the village butcher manage? He's not called up, is round and fat and satisfied. It's rumored that he's got connections with the district command and supplies them with food and is thus absolutely indispensable. Who will monitor this? Who will hang the bell around the cat's neck?"






"This is the situation that confronted those who fought at the Front when they marched back into the homeland after the armistice", Tor concludes. "They found workers' and military councils who tore off the epaulettes and medals of the officers, who dissolved military order and who decided on how things were to continue. Nobody organized any kind of integration into civilian life. Those who had been smart and clever enough to obtain a position in the homeland in good time were able to rent one of the few free apartments and could establish themselves. The soldier from the Front stood before closed doors. Nobody cared for him, he had to try to help himself".

October 1914: Belgium - The Peace After The Storm

In his diary entry of October 23, 1914, Felix describes his regiment's journey through Belgium to Lille, the destroyed landscape of rural Belgium and the destruction of Leuven and Lille, then the sound of the canons at the Front, even though it is 20 km away.

October 23, 1914
We're on the way to Lille, and already have 3 nights of our journey behind us. Our route so far has been Lechfeld, Augsburg, Ulm, Kannstadt, Bietigheim, Bruchsal, Mannheim and on the left-hand side of the Rhine up to Cologne. We've been fed very well everywhere, partially by the provision stations, partially due to the incredible enthusiasm of the people, who fed us with all manner of edible and drinkable stuff in every place where our train stopped. From Cologne, we travelled on to Aachen and Herbestal and then into enemy territory towards Liege. Then on past destroyed Leuven to Brussels, where we met, at a station in the suburbs, a naval division that was at the storming of Antwerp, and who were now to be sent to an undisclosed location.

Of course, we were not informed of the destination of our journey at any time. Our commander received a telegram at each of the major stations informing him of the next destination. In Brussels, we had not yet given up our hope of a good life in Antwerp, so that the command we received there to proceed to Lille came as a great surprise.

[Felix then goes on to describe the provisions they had during the journey, which also contained a large amount of red wine].

From what I have seen of Belgium so far, it is very beautiful, and I feel very sad for the country. One solitary park, with meadows of seed-green, poplars and pastures, the black and white cows that animate this picture so harmoniously, and the symbols of the country - the windmills. And everywhere the image of peace, the peace after the storm.

Then Leuven. I couldn't see one house that still possessed a roof or a window, at least not near the railway line. We saw a large number of empty railway trains that bore testimony to major military transportation.



9 a.m. We're still in a good mood, singing and playing the mouth harmonica, and making lots of good and bad jokes.

Felix in an early uniform, 1914

Lille, October 23, evening after 6 p.m. This afternoon we arrived at a station in the suburbs, shunted for a few hours, but were unable to enter Lille as the tracks had been destroyed. Everywhere, we could see the traces of defense battles, mainly in the suburbs; apparently they fought for each single house. The stronghold has been in German possession for the last three days. Approaching Lille, we had heard a distant muffled rolling; but now we could clearly hear the thunder of the canons doing their work 20 kilometers from Lille.

I saw something interesting this afternoon. We were able to see how airplanes are shot down. One little cloud appears next to another in the blue sky, and the plane forms the front point of this almost straight line. The image is not unlike a flying dragon with a tail.

Droll Smokers

Tor Kiefer, who had served as the deputy senior physician of his regiment during World War I, was a distinguished doctor in Kaiserslautern until his death in 1985. In addition, he became a renowned art critic and published various works of art criticism, including a book in 1976 on the Belgian painter James Ensor. In June 1974, Tor combined both his medical knowledge and his appreciation of Ensor in an article for the Deutsches Ärzteblatt (German Medical Journal) entitled "Drollige und weniger drollige Raucher" ("Droll and Not So Droll Smokers"). At the time of writing this article, Tor was 85 years old. An excerpt of the article is shown here.

Tor's book on Ensor, published in 1976

"Two years after the end of World War I", Tor writes, "peoples' habits changed to a different style - in fashion, drinking, society dances, diet. And women cut their hair short - a revolution! Some people are shocked. And even worse - ladies start to smoke. Nobody pays much attention any more when they smoke in cafés. But older people frown on it, associate it with the demimonde.

Ensor has a girlfriend who smokes. He doesn't want to know about it and presents her with his skulls. She, reacts, however, in a cocky, jokey manner - not now, please!

He paints a canvas, 29.5 by 25.25 cm. Augusta is portrayed seated, her hand raised and holding a lit cigarette. And what's also new - Augusta in a white blouse with a short skirt; you can see her legs, and she's wearing the cartwheel hat of the 1920s. She's about to put her cigarette to her mouth. But before she does, she looks at him impishly and says, "You're not going to tell me what to do!" On the other side, a man approaches her with a tray bearing a skull with a fat cigar between its teeth. At the bottom of the picture we see a skull with a pipe".

James Ensor, "Droll Smokers", 1920

"The faces of the main figures are extremely arresting", Tor continues. "Linear, distinctive, New Objectivity.* Of the old traditions, we can see the drapery of the curtains, the flowered carpet and in the foreground the plant tripod.

Ensor is a Janus; he oversees the past and the future. We are reminded of this painting when we see the advertisements of active non-smokers that appear today in newspapers and on posters, since we know more about bronchial carcinoma".

Tor's article in the
"Deutsches Ärzteblatt" in 1974

*New Objectivity:
In German: "Neue Sachlichkeit" emerged in Germany in the 1920s as a pseudo-Expressionist movement in the aftermath of World War I. It characterized the attitude of life in the Weimar Republic during the 1920s and spawned movements in literature, art, music and architecture.

Kriegsgetraut: Married In Wartime

Felix Kiefer married his sweetheart Erne Schumann, who was working as a nurse at Sedan at the Western Front, on July 20, 1916. Felix was serving at the Eastern Front at the time, near Poworsk, in today's Ukraine.

Felix and Erne were probably married in a ceremony particularly popular during the First World War known as "Kriegstrauung" and kept the poem below "Kriegsgetraut" (roughly translated "Married in Wartime") by Eva Lichtwarth. The poem contains phrases and words that are no longer used in modern-day German, but I have roughly translated the first two verses.

Kriegsgetraut by Eva Lichtwarth 

Married in war! Solid ties based on trust,
Are bound across the country.
Bringing the festive news
Of life's sacred hour,
Singing, in these hard times of iron,
Of love's blessed ways.

Married in war! Despite death and night
Happiness blooms and love wakes.
Spreads consoling mercy
At the calm and warm hearth.
As if of steel, so firmly founded
Is the band that binds hearts.







Many couples were married in this simplified ceremony during the two world wars in Germany, a procedure called "Kriegstrauung". The complexity of the process was reduced such that a wedding could be carried out quickly and easily. During the Second World War, additional rations were provided for such weddings.

Felix and Erne in Munich

In 1914, it was reported in Baden that the number of weddings escalated at an explosive rate. Barely had mobilization been announced than young couples stormed the civil registry offices and then the churches - alone in Pforzheim, around 35 km from Ettlingen, 111 marriages were recorded between August 1 and August 6, 1914.

After mobilization was announced, Felix signed up to join the Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment No. 16 on August 10, 1914. This regiment is well-known for another of its members, Adolf Hitler, who joined up just six days later than Felix on August 16, 1914. It is likely that they would have been acquainted with each other, although Felix held the higher rank of Leutant to Hitler's Gefreite.

Art From The Western Front

In early 1918, Tor Kiefer's regiment, the German Reserve Infantry Regiment 250, had been moved to the Western Front after the end of the war against Russia in the East. Tor's regiment had been stationed at the Eastern Front since early 1915, but in late 1917 Germany won the war against Russia. This enabled the German forces to be repositioned at the Western Front, and from the end of January 1918, Tor's regiment was based between Monampteuil and Laon, behind the Chemin des Dames.

Laon Cathedral by Tor Kiefer, January 1918

On February 2, 1918, Tor wrote to his brother Oskar in Ettlingen: "We're in a bad position here, but we'll be moving out soon".

As the deputy senior physician of his regiment, Tor had several privileges. His quarters, for example, were of a far better standard than those of the average soldier, he had proper paper as well as writing and drawing implements, and his letters home were not censored. During the period of January through March 1918, Tor made several sketches and colored drawings of the surrounding towns and villages in his sketchbooks.

Tor made this drawing of Laon Cathedral in January 1918 from his position at the Western Front.

Monampteuil by Tor Kiefer, February 9, 1918

The Hindenburg Line was the German line of defense in the First World War. It was named in several sections: the Alberich Stellung stretched from St. Quentin to Laon, while the Brunhilde Stellung stretched from Laon across the Champagne Front.


Tor's regiment was involved in heavy fighting along the Brunhilde section of the Western Front during the first few months of 1918.

In February 1918, Tor painted this watercolor of the ruins of bombed buildings in Monampteuil. This small commune was heavily shelled by artillery during the war.

Urcel Behind The Railway Embankment
by Tor Kiefer, March 3, 1918

In early March 1918, Tor made this colored drawing of houses behind the railway embankment in Urcel. Like Monampteuil, Urcel is a small commune in the department of Aisne in Picardy. In this picture, we can see that the roof of the house on the left has been bombed through. Many buildings, such as the Eglise Notre-Dame d'Urcel, suffered great damage during the war.

Apparently, the terrain around Urcel was also heavily shelled, as we can see from Tor's next picture below.

Shell Hole Terrain at Urcel
by Tor Kiefer, March 15, 1918

Tor's color drawing of this shell hole terrain from March 1918 show us how heavily the area around Urcel was being bombed. At the bottom left of the picture we can see barbed wire which means that Tor must have been looking out over a no man's land from the position of a trench.

It appears that much later in life, when he was 84 years old, Tor returned to the trenches of the Western Front and once again sketched the landscape.

In the picture on the left below, we can see Tor's photo of a now overgrown trench in the forest at the Western Front. The picture on the right is Tor's colored sketch of this trench, dated May 18, 1973.

August 1914: Enthusiasm In The Ranks

Felix Kiefer started a diary as soon as he joined up to serve in Munich at the outbreak of the First World War in 1914. Later, he typed up these initial notes, and probably supplemented them to a certain extent. The result is an extremely detailed memoir of the first few months of Felix's war. It also reflects the high degree of enthusiasm for war that was felt generally across Europe at this time. Felix's other diaries, from 1914 through to 1916, will be shown on this site under Felix's Diaries and have been transcribed and translated from his handwritten books.

Note: The Himmler to whom Felix refers in his memoir below cannot refer to Heinrich Himmler, who was too young to join up in 1914. From the description that Felix provides, however, it is also unlikely that the Himmler referred to is Gebhard Himmler, Heinrich's older brother, who also came from Munich and who also served in the same regiment as Felix - the Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment No. 16. The identity of the Himmler referred to here thus remains a mystery, but it seems extremely likely that Felix would have come to know Gebhard Himmler during the course of the war.

This initial extract from Felix's diary tells us about his trip to the Western Front from Munich, with the first stop at Lechfeld.

"After mobilization was announced on August 2, 1914, I endeavored to be accepted into the Bavarian army. After a lot of back-and-forth I succeeded, on August 10. I was accepted into the  Reserve Batallion of the 2nd Infantry Regiment, 1st Company. Shortly before the company marched out to the field, I was moved to the 4th new company of the Regiment list, on September 1, 1914. This regiment was later named the Bavarian Reserve Regiment 16. It belonged to the 12th Bavarian Infantry Brigade, 6th Bavarian Reserve Division, and initially to the 15th Baden Army Corps. On our journey to enemy territory, we were informed that we now belonged to the 24th Reserve Army Corps. Our superior officers were Oberst List, Major Graf Zech, Hauptmann Rubenbauer and Leutnant Abelein.

In the night of October 12, at 3 am, our embarkation into a 48-wagon railway train was complete, and we travelled with much cheering to the camp at Lechfeld. I wrote in my diary, "Finally we're at the point where either they need us in the field or they have to let our enthusiasm run wild. We've been waiting for this move for weeks. At last!"
I'm a cyclist and as an Unteroffizier, I more or less have the command over the other cyclists in the company. My comrade, Unteroffizier Lueginger is, let's say, my good-natured companion. And then we have a few jolly people who are new to the whole thing, witty and stalwart, as one expects from good military cyclists. [Felix then goes on to list and describe his cyclist comrades].

Felix in 1914

So, we're on the train and there's quite a lot to tell about that. 6 of us have taken a compartment, which is jammed full. In peacetime, it would be sufficient for 10 people, but you have to realize that we weren't just travelling by day, also by night and that our benches are also full of a mass of luggage for which there is no room at all in the nets, which are much too small. Our compartment is such that one of the benches takes up the whole width of the carriage, while the other one is shortened due to the door to the WC. In my compartment, there's Lueginger, Kaiser, Kühnert, me and a Tambour Geith, a Landwehr 2, an old gentleman, jovial and modest, as well as our driver of the food truck, Himmler, from Munich, an entertaining blighter, just lamenting now and again how he had to leave his business. But he can usually be appeased with some grub, especially if the grub is swimming in wine. The night encampment was initially quite a problem. Since last night, three men have been lying on the benches and three on the floor. One is lying underneath a bench, the luggage is underneath the long bench and the two other men are lying in the corridor".

The Kiefer Brothers

Felix and Theodor (Tor) Kiefer were the youngest brothers of Oskar Kiefer, a sculptor from Ettlingen in Baden, Germany. Their father was Alexander, a renowned architect in the town. The brothers' other siblings were Erwin, who became a chemist, and three sisters: Sylvestra, Maria and Martha. Both Sylvestra and Maria worked as nurses in lazarets during the First World War.

Felix (standing) and Tor in their
brother Oskar's atelier

Born in 1891 and 1889 respectively, Felix and Tor both served in the Great War. Felix, who was studying in Munich at the outbreak of war, joined the Bavarian Reserve-Infantrie-Regiment No. 16 and became a Leutnant der Reserve (Reserve Lieutenant). Tor was also at university studying medicine and broke off his studies to join the Red Cross in 1914. Shortly afterwards, he was sent to the Western Front. However, both brothers spent much of the war at the Eastern Front. Felix was injured twice and had two spells in a lazaret, as well as a hospital in Hamburg, while Tor went on to become the deputy senior physician of his regiment.

Tor (left) and Felix Kiefer

Some of Tor's letters sent to his family from the Front have already been published on our partner blog www.ettlingenww1.blogspot.de, but a selection will also be published here under Tor's Letters.

Felix married Erne Schumann during the war, and a selection of their letters will be published here under Felix and Erne. In 1927, Felix and Erne, confronted with the poverty and hardship of the Weimar years in Germany, made the decision to emigrate with their children to Honduras, where he worked as a chemist. The next year, they moved to the eastern United States, where he continued his work as a chemist, specializing in food preservatives. His descendants still live in the US and have contributed a wealth of letters, diaries and photos which have served as a major source for this blog.

Tor set up a practice in Kaiserslautern as a dermatologist and later psychologist after the war, and became a patron of the arts. In addition to his medical work (he later became the senior Medical Counsellor for the city of Kaiserslautern), he was a prolific writer all his life, writing various novels (unpublished) as well as books of art criticism (published) and philosophical/psychological works (published). Tor also wrote poetry (despite his efforts, unpublished), some of which will be shown under Tor's Poetry and, particularly in the two years following the war, painted. Some of his pictures will be shown under Tor's Art.

Both brothers were deeply affected by their experiences during the Great War, and these memories and experiences remained with them all their lives.