Joseph Mohr, a 24-year-old Austrian priest, believed he needed to instill peace and hope into the lives of his troubled and bewildered parishioners. The year was 1816, just a year after the army of Napoleon destroyed their city and countryside. The salt trade, on whose livelihood the town survived, was savagely disrupted from the fighting. The salt trade was so important to the economy that the regions capital was named Salzburg, which means “Salt City.”      

Mohr was an accomplished musician and he penned a poem of hope for Christmas Day, which was titled Silent Night, Holy Night. Two years later Mohr asked his friend, organist and teacher Franz Xaver Gruber, to set the poem to music. As mice had eaten through the bellows of the church organ, the two sang a duet accompanied by guitar.  …