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Home > The Off Farm Income Podcast > OFI 231: Merry Christmas 2016! From Autumm, Hattie & Matt
Podcast: The Off Farm Income Podcast
Episode:

OFI 231: Merry Christmas 2016! From Autumm, Hattie & Matt
Category: Business
Duration: 00:00:00
Publish Date: 2016-12-23 01:30:32
Description: OFI 231: Merry Christmas 2016! From Autumm, Hattie & Matt The picture you see above is of American graves in Belgium.  The graves are of those who fought and died in World War II to liberate Europe. Our Christmas episode this year ties together the Greatest Generation, farming and story of a truce inside a hunting cabin in the Ardennes Forest on Christmas Eve, 1944.  I like to try and find something special to present you with on our Christmas episode, and the movie Silent Night / Peace on Earth which tells the story of this truce kept coming to mind.  I hope you enjoy this episode, and I hope you have a wonderful Christmas! Books And Movies Referenced In This Episode: Transcript Of David Hunt's Article: No Repeat of the Christmas Truce of 1914 In World War Two, there was no truce similar to the one that occurred during Christmas in 1914 in World War One. In that earlier conflict, thousands of British, French and German soldiers, exhausted by the unprecedented slaughter of the previous five months, left their trenches and met the enemy in No Man's Land, exchanging gifts, food and stories. Generals on both sides, determined to prevent fraternization in future, saw to it that such activities would be severely punished and so there were no more Christmas truces the rest of that war or the next. But, in December of 1944, during the Battle of the Bulge, while the Americans fought for their lives against a massive German onslaught, a tiny shred of human decency happened on Christmas Eve. A German mother made it so. Three American soldiers, one badly wounded, were lost in the snow-covered Ardennes Forest as they tried to find the American lines. They had been walking for three days while the sounds of battle echoed in the hills and valleys all around them. Then, on Christmas Eve, they came upon a small cabin in the woods. Elisabeth Vincken and her 12-year-old son, Fritz, had been hoping her husband would arrive to spend Christmas with them, but it was now too late. The Vinckens had been bombed out of their home in Aachen, Germany and had managed to move into the hunting cabin in the Hurtgen Forest about four miles from Monschau near the Belgian border. Fritz's father stayed behind to work and visited them when he could. Their Christmas meal would now have to wait for his arrival. Elisabeth and Fritz were alone in the cabin. WW2: Battle of the Bulge. American soldiers. Visitors at the Cabin There was a knock on the door. Elisabeth blew out the candles and opened the door to find two enemy American soldiers standing at the door and a third lying in the snow. Despite their rough appearance, they seemed hardly older than boys. They were armed and could have simply burst in, but they hadn't, so she invited them inside and they carried their wounded comrade into the warm cabin. Elisabeth didn't speak English and they didn't speak German, but they managed to communicate in broken French. Hearing their story and seeing their condition-- especially the wounded soldier-- Elisabeth started preparing a meal. She sent Fritz to get six potatoes and Hermann the rooster-- his stay of execution, delayed by her husband's absence, rescinded. Hermann's namesake was Hermann Goering, the Nazi leader, who Elisabeth didn't care much for. WW2: Battle of the Bulge, Young German soldiers More Visitors While Hermann roasted, there was another knock on the door and Fritz went to open it, thinking there might be more lost Americans, but instead there were four armed German soldiers. Knowing the penalty for harboring the enemy was execution, Elisabeth, white as a ghost, pushed past Fritz and stepped outside. There was a corporal and three very young soldiers, who wished her a Merry Christmas, but they were lost and hungry. Elisabeth told them they were welcome to come into the warmth and eat until the food was all gone, but that there were others inside who they would not cons...
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