Martin Adler was put in contact with Bruno, Mafalda and Giuliana Naldi – all now in their 80s – last year, speaking with them for the first time in more than seven decades.

The search began when Adler asked his daughter Rachelle to try and track down the three children from a black and white photo, taken with the then 20-year-old soldier in 1944, to see if any of them were still alive.

It was a long shot, given that Adler did not know the siblings’ names or that of the town he had met them in.

Miraculously, within days the three siblings were tracked down, thanks to social media and a touch of good luck, and they held a virtual meeting with Adler at his home in Florida on December 15.

The veteran was unable to travel at the time, due to COVID-19 restrictions, but vowed “to live long enough” to make the journey back to Italy.

On Monday, after 77 years, he did just that, meeting the Naldi siblings in an emotional reunion at the Bologna airport.

“My heart is bursting,” he said, wearing a t-shirt emblazoned with an image of his treasured photograph.

Martin Adler pictured with the Naldi siblings in the original photo, in 1944. (Photo: ANSA)

Adler, who fought along the Gothic Line as the Nazis retreated northwards, recounts that he and fellow soldier, John Bronsky, entered a seemingly empty house in the village of Cassano di Monterenzio in October 1944.

When they heard a noise coming from a large wicker basket, they thought German soldiers might be hiding inside and so prepared to shoot.

At that moment, a panicked mother entered the room shouting: “Don’t shoot …bambini, bambini!”

The three siblings, aged between three and six at the time, then jumped out of the basket.

After identifying himself, the soldier gave the children chocolate and asked if he could take a photograph with them.

Their mother agreed, so long as she could first dress them in their finest clothes.

On Monday, still calling the octogenarian siblings “bambini”, Adler presented each one with a bar of chocolate, just as he did when they climbed out of that basket all those years ago.

On Tuesday, Adler visited the house where he first met the Naldi siblings.