The Christmas Massacre 1914 Nobody Remembers

The Forgotten Battle of the Buchenkopf | Tête des Faux 1914–1918 The Tête des Faux — in German, the Buchenkopf — is a 1,208-metre summit in the northern Vosges, two kilometres south of Le Bonhomme and ten kilometres west of Kaysersberg. Before 1914, this ridgeline was the Franco-German border established by the Treaty of Frankfurt in 1871. When war came in August 1914, it became a front line. It would remain one for four years. French Chasseurs Alpins took the summit on 2 December 1914. Three weeks later, on Christmas Eve, German forces counterattacked in a night assault through snowstorm conditions. 137 French soldiers were killed. Over 500 Germans were killed or wounded. Six hundred casualties in a single night — the bloodiest engagement on the entire Vosges front. There was no truce here. No football. No shared cigarettes. After the Christmas battle, the Germans consolidated below the summit and began constructing what would become one of the most elaborate mountain fortresses on the Western Front: concrete bunkers, a cable railway running 2.3 kilometres up from Lapoutroie, an electric pump drawing water from the Étang du Devin, a field hospital, two cemeteries. The front line ran directly over the summit ridge and did not move again until the Armistice. 408 French soldiers are buried in the Cimetière Duchesne, west of the summit. The German dead were transferred after the war to Collet du Linge. The concrete remains. The wire remains. The cable railway station at the Roche de Corbeau — walls nearly a metre thick — still stands in the forest, classified as a Monument historique since 1932. On 11 November 1918, the Germans walked off the mountain in order. The border they had held for four years ceased to exist the same day. Alsace returned to France. The Buchenkopf became French territory — not because anyone had been pushed off it, but because the war ended somewhere else. ___ Chapters: 00:00 - Intro 02:10 - Cable Railway Bunker 04:16 - The Ridge 07:56 - Eisenschmid Fortress 09:22 - The Fortified Mountain 19:17 - Historical Background 20:35 - Ascent through more Positions 22:54 - Fortified Summit 33:26 - The Actual Summit 35:46 - French Monument & Descent 38:08 - What happened afterwards & a few more positions 41:45 - Recap ___ ⚠️ These battlefields are protected historical sites under French heritage law. Removing ANY battlefield artifacts is punishable by significant fines. These items are protected historical heritage and a memorial to those who fell here. ___ © 2025 WalkingTheTrenches. ___ #WW1 #Buchenkopf #TêteDesFaux #Vosges #Alsace #GreatWar #Trenches #GermanFortifications #MountainWarfare #BattlefieldArchaeology #MilitaryHistory #France #Germany #ChasseurAlpins #Christmas1914 #WesternFront ___ Sources & Credits: FRAD063-203 Gilbert ROBERT — 1914 — Europeana 1914-1918, CC BY-SA Chasseurs alpins / Mitrailleuse — Europeana 1914-1918, CC BY-SA Maschinenraum Kompressorenanlage Buchenkopf — Landesarchiv Baden-Württemberg, CC BY https://www2.landesarchiv-bw.de/ ___ Further Reading: Cochet, F. / Grandhomme, J.-N. (eds.): Guerre des Vosges et guerres de montagne, 1914–1918. Paris: Bernard Giovanangeli, 2016. Krafft von Dellmensingen: Das Bayernbuch vom Weltkriege 1914–1918. Stuttgart: Belser, 1930. Roess, D. / Balmier, E.: Scènes de tranchées dans les Vosges. Editions du Rhin, 2002. Historique du 14e Bataillon Alpin de Chasseurs à Pied, 1914–1918.