I: Feature Story: "If A Hostage Should Die!"

Pages: 10

Script: Stan Lee
Layouts: Jack Kirby
Pencils: John Romita
Inks: Frank Giacoia (credited as Frank Ray)
Letters: Sam Rosen

First Appearance: Francois

Villain: Nazis

Guest Appearance: Agent 13, Francois

Setting: Paris, France; Falais Gap

Synopsis: While watching documentary footage of the allied liberation of Nazi-occupied France, Steve reflects back upon the lost love he shared with the blonde partisan fighter he met on the battlefield. His memory fades further into the past, when he was leading the charge against Nazis at the Falais Gap in France.

After dispatching a band of escaping Nazis, Cap watches as the resistance fighters take the villains as prisoners. In a quiet moment, he embraces the young woman, a fighter among the partisan resistance. She declares that she will "never forget these weeks, with Captain America fighting" at their side. They both declare their love for each other, and a commitment to see it through after the conclusion of the war, even though she doesn't know Cap's secret identity.

Suddenly, Cap is called to handle another skirmish with the Nazis, while the woman tells him she is on her way to Paris to continue fighting for liberation. They part, but not before promising to reunite.

Days and weeks later, the woman has wound up a captive of the Nazis in Paris. As she is marched out to be killed by a firing squad, her last thoughts are of the life she will never live out with her love, Captain America. But miraculously, the base is overtaken by resistance fighters and allied forces. She is able to race to freedom, but an artillery shell explodes near her, knocking her to the ground.

Cap has arrived in Paris, ready to help restore order after the big Allied push to cleanse the city of Nazis, but also fervently looking for his lover. He catches up with Francois, the resistance leader, who informs Cap that the one he looks for had been taken by the gestapo and he knows nothing of her fate. Cap races to the Gestapo HQ to shake down whoever he finds to get information concerning her whereabouts. He grabs a Nazi commander by the neck and physically wrests the information from him: the Nazi tells her that she was the victim of a shell blast, but he never saw her body after the smoke cleared.

As the dramatic tableau is caught on film by an Army journalist, Cap frantically searches the area for the woman. Not knowing that Cap is in a life or death pursuit, deliriously happy GIs pick Cap up on their shoulders to parade him through the liberated streets of Paris, showcasing the ultimate American hero who helped win the day. Meanwhile, the woman walks in an amnesiac daze, in the shadows of the side streets of Paris, with Cap never seeing her.....

--synopsis by Gormuu

Issues Reprinted
Captain America from
Tales of Suspense #59-81

Click on cover image to learn more about each issue.