After 4 days of rain, August 25th, 1944 was a perfect summer’s day in Rouen, northern France.

Although there were many places where German soldiers could cross the Seine river and escape the incoming Allied armies, only a few heavy ferries and one damaged rail bridge strong enough to allow heavy armour to cross were still operational in the northern sector.
Many were those who converged on the Quai Jean de Bethencourt at Rouen cramming the long quayside with vehicles of all sizes and shapes. It is estimated that at least 4,000 vehicles were massed at a time in the Rouen area.

With the sun came the Allied air force. 24 Mitchells and 10 Bostons medium bombers of RAF’s No 137 and 139 Wings arrived over Rouen at 7 p.m and bombed the left bank. The bombs landed amid the queued vehicles destroying more than 500 with a few bombs falling on the right bank killing some of those who had already crossed the river.

Four hours earlier an SS man sitting on bollard 230 smokes his pipe while he waits his turn to cross. An almost peaceful scenario were it not for the machines of war parked in the background. They comprise a PzKpfw VI ‘Tiger’, a PzKpfw V ‘Panther’ and a PzKpfw IV of unknown units.

If they managed to get across or burned in the incoming inferno it is unknown.

Original: ECPAd

Colour by: In Colore Veritas
Ww2colourised/Taken from fb



 



 



Peaceful moment before the firestorm

Having taken part in the invasion of Poland and the Soviet Union, major Joachim Kuhn experienced firsthand the mistreatment of the local population. In 1942, he met Claus von Stauffenberg, who recruited him for the resistance and the two became close friends.
In 1943, Kuhn was promoted to major and in the same year he was in charge of hiding the explosives for a planned attack on Hitler’s life during a uniform presentation. In May 1944, he organized the bomb that Stauffenberg was to use on the 15th of July, the first date when he was designated to carry out the assassination.
On 20 July 1944, Kuhn spent the day at the Eastern front, waiting for news anxiously from Berlin. A day after the plot failed, he accompanied General Tresckow, the leader of the conspiracy in the East, to inspect the frontline. In reality, Tresckow told him that he was about to commit suicide. Kuhn tried to talk him out of it with no success, and it was him who carried Tresckow’s body back in his car. Kuhn later remembered: "When I was about a hundred yards away, I heard the hand grenades exploding. On my official account of his death by a partisan attack, General von Tresckow was buried with full military honors."
The Gestapo issued an order to arrest Kuhn not long after, when they learned about his key role in the coup. When the order reached his commanding officer, General von Ziehlberg, he refused to arrest Kuhn, and told him to go to the front and seek an honorable death. Ziehlberg was later executed in relation to this incident.
Kuhn was captured by the Red Army and remained in Soviet custody for the next 12 years. In 1945, he was sentenced to death by the National Socialists as a traitor (in his absence). In 1951, he was sentenced to 25 years of hard labour by the Soviets as a war criminal. His wrongdoing was assumed on his German uniform.
During his internment he was subjected to repeated torture and kept under such inhumane circumstances that he developed severe schizophrenia. Upon his return to Germany in 1956, his application for financial compensation was not granted because according to the ‘competent’ authority, he was expelled from the German Armed Forces on 4 August 1944, by the then head of state.
Kuhn never publicly spoke about his role in the resistance, never married or had any children. In 1994, he died alone in nursing home near Frankfrurt. Four years later he was rehabilitated by the military court of Moscow, "in the absence of crime in his actions". His honor was also restored in Germany, and he took his rightful place among those who are being remembered today.
taken from fb/German resistance 1933-1945


 Major Joachim Kuhn 

German beutepanzers (captured enemy tanks in Wehrmacht service) in Normandy in early 1944.  I believe this is a Hotchkiss H39 modified with an additional hatch on the turret.  They were kept closer to the shore for infantry support against the initial waves the Germans assumed might not have armor support.  Obsolete and lacking any real upgrades, they were still easy pickings for infantry armed with antitank weapons.  But they were better than nothing as the Mark IVs, Vs, and VIs were held inland or closer to Pas-de-Calais...