During WW2, were us troops and german troops ever friendly to each other?

Question

I saw a story on the History Channel about how on christmas a smalll group of us soldiers and german soldiers laid thier weapons down and had a christmas celebration togeather, i just wondered if there were more stories like this.......

Answer 1

This is an amazing coincidence! Are you thinking of the Christmas 1914 when the British and Germans played football? My grandfather actually took part in it. To save me telling all the story look at this news page by way of introduction.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4123107.stm

My grandfather, Leonard Baldrick Dungle, Private, Rifleman 23rd Footers, was there in the trenches. He told me that they heard the Germans singing 'Silent Night' and they just joined in. Later they called back and forth each other, and eventually someone got up and started kicking a football about. It then turned into a full game until the officers stopped it. The only thing that he was annoyed about was one of his goals being pronounced off-side.

This never happened again and he struggled to survive the next four years of bloody trench warfare.

Answer 2

Yes, and social historians have made a couple theories why:
1- The US didn't have the immediate threat from Nazi Germany that our British allies did. The need to defeat Germany wasn't as obvious as defeating Japan. When knowledge of the extermination camps became common, along with the redeployment of German units from the Eastern front (where the fighting was much more savage-that's where the anecdotes of shooting medics etc came from. Because that's what the Russians did to the Germans.) then the ground combat became more savage.
2- Some 30% of Americans can claim German ancestry, so there was some cultural sympathy. Against the Japanese, the racial and cultural differences (Bushido and the knowledge of what would happen were you to fall into Japanese hands) were such to make battle there more of a no-quarter situation.
Finally, keep in mind that the Western Allies also shot prisoners out of hand, though not as maybe, deliberately as say the Waffen SS did...

Answer 3

This Site Might Help You.

RE:
During WW2, were us troops and german troops ever friendly to each other?
I saw a story on the History Channel about how on christmas a smalll group of us soldiers and german soldiers laid thier weapons down and had a christmas celebration togeather, i just wondered if there were more stories like this.......

Answer 4

Ww2 Christmas Truce

Answer 5

I've heard of this before too.
I've heard other stories of Japanese troopers and American troopers hanging out together during WW2 too but don't know for sure.

As for the Americans and Germans playing football, are we talking American football or soccer football?
Because my guess is the Americans did not play much soccer football back then....

Answer 6

Wwii Christmas Truce

Answer 7

I Heard a story during WWI about german and british and us troops having tea and playing football while the armistice was being discussed

Answer 8

Yes, there were actually numerous instances of this... often in POW camps...

There's a film about the instance you're talking about called "A Midnight Clear", it's quite good.

There's another film, can't for the life of me remember the name, about a group of American solidiers trying to get British intelligence back to a base. Along the way a German solidier helps them and they save his life... it's based on a true story.

Answer 9

The "Christmas truce" is a term used to describe the brief unofficial cessation of hostilities that occurred between German, British troops stationed on the Western Front of World War I during Christmas 1914. The truce began on Christmas Eve, December 24, 1914, during World War I, when German troops began decorating the area around their trenches in the region of Ypres, Belgium, for Christmas. They began by placing candles on trees, then continued the celebration by singing Christmas carols, namely Stille Nacht (Silent Night). The British troops in the trenches across from them responded by singing English carols.

The two sides continued by shouting Christmas greetings to each other. Soon thereafter, there were calls for visits across the "No Man's Land", where small gifts were exchanged — whisky, cigars, and the like. The artillery in the region fell silent that night. The truce also allowed a breathing spell where recently-fallen soldiers could be brought back behind their lines by burial parties. Proper burials took place as soldiers from both sides mourned the dead together and paid their respect. At one funeral in No Man's Land, soldiers from both sides gathered and read a passage from the 23rd Psalm:

"The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures. He leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul. He leadeth me in the path of righteousness for his name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil."
The truce spread to other areas of the lines, and there are many stories — some perhaps apocryphal — of football matches between the opposing forces. Letters home confirm the score of one of these games to be 3–2 in favour of Germany.

In many sectors, the truce lasted through Christmas night, but in some areas, it continued until New Year's Day.

The truce occurred in spite of opposition at higher levels of the military. Earlier in the autumn, a call by Pope Benedict XV for an official truce between the warring governments had been ignored.

British commanders Sir John French and Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien vowed that no such truce would be allowed again. (However, both had left command before Christmas 1915.) In all of the following years of the war, artillery bombardments were ordered on Christmas Eve to ensure that there were no further lulls in the combat. Troops were also rotated through various sectors of the front to prevent them from becoming overly familiar with the enemy. Despite those measures, there were a few friendly encounters between enemy soldiers, but on a much smaller scale than the previous year.

Answer 10

Even though people are in the middleof a war they are still people and I am sure that some americans probably had shown mercy and even friendship to germans, I am sure there probably wasnt a whole lot of it but in the end, those soldiers who helped the germans probably felt a whole lot better about themselves.