Last Man To Die

*Last man to die*

War photographer Robert Capa took this iconic photo of an American soldier shot and killed by a German sniper in the battle for Leipzig on 18 April 1945. The soldier became known as the ‘last man to die’ in WWII after the image appeared in Life magazine’s Victory issue.

During the World war 2  final days  a platoon of machine gunners entered in a Leipzig building looking for positions to set up covering fire points which would protect foot soldiers of the 2nd U.S. Infantry advancing across the bridge. Two members of the platoon found an open balcony. For a while one soldier fired the gun while the other reload it. Then one soldier went inside and the other manned the smoking gun alone. While absorbed in reloading it, a German sniper’s bullet from the street pierced his forehead. He crumpled to the floor, dead.

Robert  climbed through a balcony window into the flat to photograph the dead man. The photographs show the rapid spread of the soldier’s blood across the floor. Soldier was identified as Raymond J. Bowman, age 21, born in Rochester, New York. The images were published in Life magazine’s Victory edition on 14 May with the caption “The picture of the last man to die”. They would become some of the most memorable images of the Second World War.