Most of you have probably never heard the name Alfred Anderson. Frankly, I hadn't either, until Scotland's oldest man passed away in late November.

Alfred Anderson was the last known link to a remarkable chapter in history, the 1914 Christmas Truce. I blogged about it last year, and I feel it especially important to remember again this year.

In 1914, well before the United States had entered World War I, the soldiers were embroiled in trench warfare on the Western front. On Christmas Day, both sides stopped fighting and emerged from their trenches in an informal truce that was only ended days later with threats of court martial from senior officers. Anderson was an 18 year old at the time. Later, he would say that what he remembered was the "eerie sound of silence" as guns and cannon were silenced by men who realized that, for one day at least, "peace on earth, goodwill to man" was more important than political ideologies.

As the latest debates have centered on whether or not there is a "war on Christmas", it is important to niote that, for many years, Christmas has had a secular meaning at some level as a holiday of "peace on earth, goodwill to man". It is the one holiday where we get to see the best of humanity played out, at least in America, and probably in much iof Western Europe.

Alfred Anderson was just a soldier in a bloody war that was once known as "the war to end all wars". But he was witness to a great act of humanity, one that should not be forgotten.