"The German ultimatum ordering the Dutch commander of Rotterdam to cease fire was delivered to him at 10:30 a.m. on May 14, 1940. At 1:22 p.m., German bombers set the whole inner city of Rotterdam ablaze, killing 30,000 of its inhabitants."* Aerial view of the ruins of Rotterdam. 208-PR-10L-3.
(* Note: This 30,000 which appears in this photos' caption is now seen as inaccurate. Historians believe the number who died was between 800-980. See The Oxford Companion to World War II, editors I.C.B. Dear and M.R.D. Foot, Oxford University Press, 1995, p. 968.)
