1-276-602 - Art Media/Heritage Images

Liberation of Paris, 25 August 1944. A jeep of the French 12th Regiment of Cuirassiers (2nd Armoured Division) taking two German officers to surrender negotiations. Hitler had ordered that Paris be defended to the last man and destroyed before it fell into Allied hands, but the military governor of the city, General Dietrich von Choltitz, declined to carry out the order and surrendered to the French on 25 August.