"Look at Those G.I. Shoes!"

Waggling its wings, a German Messerschmitt 109 skimmed in low and fast to the huge air base of the Fifteenth Air Force Headquarters in Italy. U.S. gunners held their fire. Reason: a U.S. flag was painted crudely on the fuselage, white stars daubed on the wings. The plane landed, braked to a stop. Tall, handsome Captain Carl Cantacuzino of the Rumanian Air Force climbed out. To the crowd of airmen who ran up, he said: "I have somebody here you'll be glad to see."

He unfastened the fuselage plate of the radio compartment. Someone in the plane stuck his feet out. A man in the crowd yelled: "Look at those G.I. shoes!''

The passenger was Lieut. Colonel James A. Gunn III of Kelseyville, Calif., who had been shot down over the oil fields of Ploesti--"the hottest target on the face of the earth"--two weeks before. He was one of more than 3,000 U.S. airmen downed in Rumania in 13 months of raids. Two-thirds had been killed. But 1,101, plus 25 Britons, were still alive in prison camps around Bucharest. They were well treated but they chafed.

When they heard young King Mihai announce on the radio that Rumania had switched to the Allied side in the war, they persuaded the prison commander to turn them loose--with their side arms. But it was not enough to be free: they wanted to be back in Allied territory.

Colonel Gunn interviewed the Rumanian air minister, who introduced him to Cantacuzino, Rumania's leading ace, with a score of 64 downed Allied planes. Cantacuzino agreed to fly Gunn to Italy.

Colonel Gunn told his story to General Sir Henry Maitland Wilson and his U.S. air commander, Lieut. General Ira Eaker. They made a quick decision. Within twelve hours 38 Flying Fortresses were speeding toward Bucharest; more soon followed. At Bucharest's airport the bombers took aboard the 1,100-odd men and brought them back to Italy. Fifty were wounded, 17 on crutches and ten on stretchers. All were happy. So were their families in the U.S., who were promptly notified.

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