Originally published by the International Federation of Resistance Fighters – https://fir.at/en/
We commemorate the liberation of the French capital by the forces of the French Resistance and French units as part of the Allied forces on August 25, 1944.
Following the landing of Anglo-American troops in Normandy in June 1944, the French Resistance stepped up its military and political actions in support of the Allied forces and as its own contribution to the restoration of a free France.
On August 18, a general strike in Marseille blocked the movement of the German units and liberated the port city of Toulon, an important base of the Nazi navy. The forces of the Resistance, the F.F.I. (Forces françaises de l’intérieur), succeeded in taking control of large areas in the south of France. The Wehrmacht had already been defeated in Grenoble on August 22.
On August 10, a strike by railroad workers began in the Vitry workshops in the greater Paris area, followed on August 15 by metro workers and even the police. The next day, postal workers joined in, maintaining telephone service only for the connections that were essential to the Resistance. Radio Paris, under the orders of the occupying power, ceased all broadcasts on August 17. In view of the mobilization of the population, the “Comité Parisien de Libération” (Paris Liberation Committee) distributed posters on 18 August calling for an “uprising for liberation”, which was actually launched on 19 August. The fighting units used two tactics, which one participant described as follows: they disoriented the enemy by unsettling them, disorientated them with multiple attacks in numerous places and thus gave the impression of greater fighting strength than was actually the case. At the same time, gas and electricity works and the telephone exchange were occupied and the blowing up of important bridges by armed fighters was prevented.
Colonel Henri Rol-Tanguy, a communist, officer of the International Brigades in Spain and commander-in-chief of the Resistance forces in the Paris region, then ordered a general mobilization from his headquarters in the city’s catacombs on 20 August. Rol-Tanguy instructed his chief of staff, Major Gallois, to contact the American-French troops advancing on Paris to ask them to enter the capital as quickly as possible. US General Patton refused to send his units to Paris. Gallois therefore sought out the French General Leclerc, who, contrary to American orders, decided to help the insurgents in Paris and accelerated his tanks towards Paris. On the evening of August 23, they reached the city limits and moved towards the center, fighting. Rol-Tanguy was certainly particularly pleased that one of the first military units to reach the city limits on August 24, 1944 was “La Nueve”, a formation in which mainly former Spanish fighters from various countries fought for the liberation of France.
The insurgents themselves had occupied the town hall and surrounded the occupying forces in the Senate building and the “Prinz Eugen” barracks. When F.F.I. Colonel Fabien took the Senate building with the help of seven of Leclerc’s tanks, the German occupation commander Dietrich von Choltitz surrendered at his headquarters in the Hotel Meurice. He was first taken to the Prefecture of Police, then to Montparnasse station, where he signed the document of surrender, which bore the signatures of General Leclerc and the commander of the F.F.I., Colonel Rol-Tanguy.
In the following days, the entry of the other Allied units into Paris turned into a veritable triumphal procession to the cheers of the population. One of the participants in the liberation of Paris was Peter Gingold, a German who had fought in the ranks of the Resistance.
As in the past, numerous public events will be held this year to commemorate the liberation. The “Association 24 August 1944” is making its own contribution by organizing a programme together with the city to honour the Spanish fighters who reached the city on 24 August at 9 pm as part of the military unit “La Nueve”. In memory of the triumphal procession of the French units in 1944, a grand parade will take place on August 25, 2024 from the Porte d’Orléans to Place Denfert Rochereau.
On this occasion, FIR congratulates all anti-fascist associations in France that are committed to remembering the struggle of the Resistance and all forces of the anti-Hitler coalition and to passing on the legacy to future generations.