On 30 April 1943, returning from a raid on the ferry slips at Messina, Sicily, the B-24 bomber on which American airmen John Gaffney and Albert Romero were crew members was shot down over the Mediterranean.

Seven crew members who died included 1st Lieutenant W. C. Swarner and Technical Sergeant Andrew Huska; both initially survived the crash but became panic-stricken, swallowed sea water, and drowned.

Survivors Staff Sergeant Gaffney and Sergeant Romero were picked up at sea by an Italian Air Force rescue plane.

Luigi Fedele recently wrote to me from Italy:

“My uncle—my mother’s brother—was the Pilot Crew Chief of the Italian CANT Z.506 seaplane who saved the two American ‘enemy’ airmen.

“He brought the body of Sergeant Huska on board the aircraft, even though the sergeant was already dead and the air rescue operational procedures did not allow it. In the report, to justify himself, my uncle wrote that Sergeant Huska had died during the return flight. He wanted him to be given a dignified burial as a Christian and a soldier.

When he saw Sergeant Romero crying for the death of his friend, my uncle approached him and kissed him on the cheeks, the way of offering condolences in southern Italy, to share in the pain of a ‘man’ who had lost his own ‘Brother.’

Of course, the rescue at sea by the Italian Air Force also meant capture.

As prisoners of war, Staff Sergeant Gaffney and Sergeant Romero eventually were interned in P.G. 59. For their full story, read “John Gaffney and Albert Romero Survive Crash to be Interned in P.G. 59.”

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