The Christmas football match in no man's land has long been regarded as a lone beacon of humanity in an otherwise relentless and brutal mechanised war.

History has it that, as the guns fell silent during the unofficial 'Christmas truce', men from both sides slowly put their heads above the parapets and clambered out of the trenches.

On that frosty December morning in 1914 soldiers swapped stories, showed off family photos and even played an impromptu football match amid the shell craters.

The story has come to symbolise the futility of conflict, proving that even amid the horror of the First World War, men could still display common, human decency.

"If a man kicked around a football, a few hundred metres away other men fired at each other on Christmas day, especially on the Belgian and French front" - Professor Mark Connelly

But now a Canterbury historian has suggested this iconic game, that has entered the national conscience, may never have happened.

First World War expert Professor Mark Connelly, from the University of Kent's University’s School of History, said: "Unfortunately, there is no definitive evidence that a football match did actually take place.

"Now I'd be very unsurprised to learn that someone did start kicking a ball around, but if a man kicked around a football, a few hundred metres away other men fired at each other on Christmas day, especially on the Belgian and French front."

Prof Connelly says he has no desire to destroy people's cherished beliefs about the match, but argues that our rose-tinted view of the truce has clouded our collective understanding of what happened that December morning in 1914.

He said: "Most of the men on the front in 1914 are pre-war regular soldiers. Veterans of the South African war and various colonial skirmishes.

"They are men who are used to killing. They haven't discovered some great well of new humanity within them. It's much more that killing is a job, and this is a day off.

"Why shouldn't they talk to their opponents, swap a few stories, have a bit of a laugh, and then in a very dispassionate way, a very professional way, go back to killing a few days later?"

Our 'sentimental' view of the event gets in the way of truly understanding it, argues Prof Connelly.

Video: Professor Mark Connelly discusses the Christmas truce

"What we've done is sentimentalise it out of all proportion," he argues.

"Which is not to say men at the time weren't moved by what they experienced, but we've added a sense that somehow this reveals the futility and folly of all war, especially the Great War.

"But it doesn't help us understand why killing went on for four more years. It can't simply be the rule of military discipline is so draconian that it forces men go on killing through fear of retribution from their own side.

"The only way we begin to unpick it is to admit that men were prepared to do it, did see it as a job or a duty, and were prepared to go on killing until they got the result their employers, or they themselves, thought was right."

So what did happen? That the guns fell silent along certain parts of the front line is uncontested, but to what extent did the opposing forces put aside their differences, if only for a few brief hours?

Prof Connelly said: "The vast majority of men don't do much. They realise things are quiet and they are perfectly happy with that.

"They see no reason to disturb the enemy. So they participate in the truce as much by doing nothing as by clambering out of the trenches and fraternising.

"It shows us the complexity of the situation. Truce is a long way from fraternisation.

"Undoubtedly fraternisation did occur, and men have conversations with the enemy they'll remember for the rest of their lives, but that isn't the majority experience.

It is only the British who remember Christmas 1914 with fondness. For the French and Belgian soldiers, the invading Germans were occupying their homes and threatening their families.

Their thoughts were far from friendly kick about with the enemy.

"For a lot of Belgian and French soldiers the invader is on their territory," points out Prof Connelly.

"For a Belgian soldier, the idea of standing around talking to the enemy is totally alien.

"If the Germans were sitting across east Kent, would the British people have found it so romantic that French and Beligians were having a bit of a laugh with the Germans?"

"I've never seen myself as an iconoclast, looking to destroy people's cherished visions. We normally find these visions have a kernel of truth to them. It's not that it's nonsense; not at all.

"My issue as a historian is getting beyond that. Let's isolate the kernel of truth, but let's think about the wider context."