In this episode, we look at Christmas in wartime, both on the home front and in the front line. We talk about a lucky purchase from a small Northamptonshire auction house that provided insight not only into the political history of South Africa, but also an affectionate Christmas gift sent to a soldier in 1916 who was to lose his life just sixteen days later, in tragic circumstances.
Fifty-six men with the surname Christmas lost their lives in World War One, and we look at two of these soldiers, who came from very different ends of the social spectrum, and both of whom died in trench raids on the front.
Captain Bernard Christmas came from a well-to-do family, was educated at Public School, and lived off private means. Private Walter Christmas, by contrast, grew up in the slums of East London and was employed as a "pure worker" in a leather factory, one of the most ghastly jobs in all of Edwardian England.
We discover why cigarettes were the true gift of love for a man in the trenches, how an unfortunate mix-up involving a Christmas pudding and pigeon led to "Captain Custard" gaining his nickname, and why you should never accept a Christmas drink from a drunk Army chef. We finish our episode at the grave of the fabulously named Private Bertie Snowball and hear about how his legacy lives on through the Carnoustie golf club.
I wish each and every one of you a very Happy Christmas and peaceful New Year - Footsteps of the Fallen will be back in 2022!
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