For man, sports has always been popular. Whether its playing or just talk about it, its a common ground for everybody. At the start of World War 1, men volunteered for the army to help win the war. Unfortunately, many of these men, although trained, would be killed after only a couple of months at the front.
The government realised this and decided they needed a new tactic. They therefore decided that they should speak to the sports clubs around Britain and try and promote whole teams joining up to help fight the war. Many athletes, football players and other sportsmen soon agreed and gave interviews to their local papers before leaving for training in the hope that it would spur the fan's on to also join. The stated that sport should be put on hold in order to fight for your country and that sport would resume when Britain's victory was declared.
In battalions you would most likely find that most of the soldiers were made up of football teams and their fan's which soon created a tight bond and common ground.
Although sport was put on hold for the duration, there was one very special football match that did take place...
Christmas Eve 1914, Ypres. A German soldier could be heard singing in German from his trench, his song, Silent Night. Suddenly all the German's joined in and could be heard in the British trenches. The British remembered the tune and started to sing in English.
On Christmas morning, every British soldier was given a Christmas gift box from the Princess Mary Gift Fund, to ensure that every soldier was remembered and had something special to open on Christmas morning. The soldiers were delighted. Shortly afterwards, a lone German soldier could be seen climbing out of his trench, with his hands held in the air. He then shouted "Happy Christmas" to the British soldiers, to the British amazement, slowly more and more Germans followed suit, smiling and laughing. The British decided that they should do the same and so they met the German's in the middle of No Man's land and shook hands.
From the trenches, the German's had brought with them Brandy and Cigars, the British brought Whisky and Christmas pudding and they all exchanged these as you would exchange presents at any peacetime Christmas. Everyone was laughing and joking and having a good time. The British decided to get out an old tin can and the British and German soldiers joined together to play a game of football across No Man's Land.
As it started to get dark, they said their goodbye's and shook hands. Many soldiers also took off a button from their jackets and exchanged them for one from what tomorrow would be their enemy's jackets in order to remember the Christmas they had just had. The following day, the war resumed and they were enemy's again.
After this day, sport wasn't played again until the end of the war. By this time many of Britain's greatest sports players had been killed or lost limbs and many more had suffered gas attacks and were unable to play the sport they loved again. This was a great sacrifice for their country, to give up the sport they loved, to more than likely never play it again.
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