The truces were not reported for a week, an unofficial press embargo broken by "The New York Times", published in the neutral United States, on 31 December. The British papers quickly followed, printing numerous first-hand accounts from soldiers in the field, taken from letters home to their families and editorials on "one of the greatest surprises of a surprising war". By 8 January pictures had made their way to the press and the "Mirror" and "Sketch" printed front-page photographs of British and German troops mingling and singing between the lines. The tone of the reporting was strongly positive, with the "Times" endorsing the "lack of malice" felt by both sides and the "Mirror" regretting that the "absurdity and the tragedy" would begin again. Author Denis Winter argues that "the censor had intervened" to prevent information about the spontaneous ceasefire from reaching the public and that the real dimension of the truce "only really came out when Captain Chudleigh in the "Telegraph" wrote after the war."