--- description: Marshal Edward Smigly-Rydz, chief of Poland's vanquished armies, acquired his double-barreled name when army companions nicknamed him "Smigly" (nimble) to describe his... title: RUMANIA: Nimble Marshal Escapes image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- * [U.S.](/section/us/) # RUMANIA: Nimble Marshal Escapes by [TIME](/author/time/) Dec 30, 1940 5:00 AM CUT by [TIME](/author/time/) Dec 30, 1940 5:00 AM CUT Marshal Edward Smigly-Rydz, chief of Poland’s vanquished armies, acquired his double-barreled name when army companions nicknamed him “Smigly” (nimble) to describe his particular qualities. After 18 days of fighting, with Hitler’s Army snapping at his heels, the nimble Marshal quit the field and skipped across to Rumania, where dignified internment in the Carpathian village of Tasmana enabled him to pursue in comfort his hobbies of gardening and landscape painting. Then the Nazis came to Rumania and Poland’s late leaders were herded into a concentration camp at Dragoslav. Last week the Marshal again justified his nickname when he and a number of lesser officers executed a mass escape from their camp and apparently from Rumania. The Gestapo, Nazi Army, Iron Guard and Rumanian police launched a nationwide manhunt, but found no trace of the nimble one. Reports from Budapest said he was aboard a steamer bound for Turkey. RUMANIA: Nimble Marshal Escapes ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/archive/6786017/rumania-nimble-marshal-escapes/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/archive/6786017/rumania-nimble-marshal-escapes/"},"headline":"RUMANIA: Nimble Marshal Escapes","datePublished":"1940-12-30T05:00:00.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-03T17:16:34.111Z","description":"Marshal Edward Smigly-Rydz, chief of Poland's vanquished armies, acquired his double-barreled name when army companions nicknamed him \"Smigly\" (nimble) to describe his...","url":"https://time.com/archive/6786017/rumania-nimble-marshal-escapes/","keywords":[],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME","url":"https://time.com/author/time/"}],"articleSection":"U.S.","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/us/","name":"U.S."}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/archive/6786017/rumania-nimble-marshal-escapes/","name":"RUMANIA: Nimble Marshal Escapes"}}]}] ```