 French giant tank Char 2C № 97 "Normandy"  of the 51st battalion of heavy tanks in the French army. 



French tanks of General Leclerc's 2nd French Armoured Division (note the Map-of-France emblem) in relaxed deployment, 25 August 1944.  

The precise location of this 'photo is identified by the shop in the background - the Librairie Rive Gauche, on the junction of the Boulevard Saint-Michel and the Rue Vaugirard, looking across the junction in the direction of the Sorbonne.  (Ah yes, I remember it well.)  

Actual fighting during the liberation of Paris was quite localised.  Two of the hot spots were quite close to this location - downhill around the Isle de la Cité, where the Germans (in obsolete French tanks) and the Communist Parisian Policemen fought out their inconclusive shoot-out around the Préfecture de Police and, even closer, back along the Rue Vaugirard, where fierce battles were fought around German barricades close to the street entrances of the Palais de Luxembourg (currently housing the French Sénat).  

As a citizen of a country not directly involved in WW2, I am always interested to find 'photos of wartime locations with which I have become familiar in more recent, happier times.  Many of these are in and around Paris.  Ah, Paris ... must get there again soon ...  JR.

I love Paris in the Summer ...

Female soldiers of the Rochambeau group, 1944 or 1945.
This group, created by the american Florence Conrad and named after the famous count who played a major role in the american war of independance, was mainly composed of french girls willing to serve on the frontline as ambulance drivers and nurses. After having convinced Leclerc to integrate them in his soon to be famous 2nd armored division, they were soon nicknamed "rochambelles" by the french soldiers and carried they duty from Africa to Germany, some of them being killed in action.
Note the crosses of Lorraine on the american helmets.