During World War II, 22-year-old Carabinieri deputy brigadier Salvo D'Acquisto makes an heroic gesture of self-sacrifice by "confessing" an act of sabotage for which 22 civilians had been rounded up by the Germans, and is executed by firing squad in their place on September 23, 1943.

• Giuseppe Fiorello
• Luigi Maria Burruano
• Biancamaria D'Amato
• Domenico Balsamo
• Eugenia Costantini
• Giovanni Esposito
• Nicola Di Pinto
• Helmut Hagen