Quote:
Originally posted by Bruce MacMillan
. Both sides partied together but camped at opposite ends of San Juan Island.
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In Europe in the 18th century and the very early 19th it was not unusual for combatants to knock off from hostilities during holidyays and attend social events together (Christmas 1914 was a distant echo of this). There is an example (7 years War I think) of a besieging force achieving a breach in a fortified town just before a holiday. Warlike activities were suspended and a stage built in the breach. A ball was held - both sides attending. The stage was then dismantled and the next day the storming party went in. In the diary of the Broitish Seaman John Wetheral (who was a POW in France in the early 19th Century) there is an account of British POWs ( other ranks and officers) held near Calais being allowed out on parole at Christmas and allowed to take the ferry packet (still running in wartime!) home to England so long as they reported back at the prison after the holiday. It was basically Napoleon who introduced much more of a total war ethos and such civilised behavious soon lapsed.