Eleven Days in August: The Liberation of Paris in 1944 torrent

Eleven Days in August: The Liberation of Paris in 1944 - Matthew Cobb [epub]

The liberation of Paris was a momentous point in 20th-century history, yet it is now largely forgotten outside France. This book is a pulsating hour-by-hour reconstruction of these tumultuous events that shaped the final phase of the war and the future of France, told with the pace of a thriller. While examining the conflicting national and international interests that played out in the bloody street fighting, it tells of how, in 11 dramatic days, people lived, fought, and died in the most beautiful city in the world.

When it became clear that Paris could not be held by the Germans, Hitler ordered the city to be destroyed. Thankfully, this order was disobeyed by General Dietrich von Choltitz, the commander of occupied Paris.

Based largely on unpublished archive material, including secret conversations, coded messages, diaries, and eyewitness accounts, this book chronicles how these August days were experienced in very different ways by ordinary Parisians, Resistance fighters, French collaborators, rank-and-file German soldiers, Allied and French spies, and the Allied and German High Commands.

Paperback: 544 pages
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK (July 1, 2014)