Lives of the First World War

Walter Mockett, the stretcher bearer who thought his pals' attempts at raisin puddings might have made good trench mortars, wrote to a friend on 28th December: "My dear Charlie, I am writing to let you know that I am alive and well. We are in billets at present. We came out Boxing Day, so that we spent part of Xmas out of the trenches. Xmas Day was spent by us in a most remarkable way. The Germans and our own fellows got out of the trenches and shook hands with each other. The Germans said 'you no shoot, we no shoot' so we agreed and all day long we walked about on top of the trenches where in the ordinary course of events it would have been instant death for us. I went over and talked to some of them. They said they were fed up with the war and ready to go home. I have a coat button, a hat badge and some cigarettes from one of them. Some of them come from London and so speak fairly good English. Opposite to us they are Saxons, who are not so bad as the Prussians. The Kaiser presented his men with cigars today"

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