The Pleasantville press. (Pleasantville, N.J.) 1912-1929, 1919-10-25
ARMY
Gets OVATION
Sergt. Hercules Korgis of Lynn
Acclaimed a Hero.
He BAGGED 256 GERMANS

Sud tbs CdplofS TO Surrenoer
and Led Them Into the American
lines-His Friends Think He Has
Earned a Congressional Medal.
Sergt. Hercules Korgis, one-man
army of Lynn, Mass, captor in one
day of 256 Germans, including a major
and seven other officers, recipient of
the CrOiX de Guerre and French
Medaille Militaire, was especially hon.
ored upon his homecoming. On his
arrival at Camp Devens he received
his first home greeting from a COM
mittee of Lynn citizens who had gone
there to meet him. He has been ac-
claimed the Sergeant Yorke of New
England. Before he volunteered / n
the army he was the chef, second cook,
dishwasher, waiter, cashier and pro-
prietor of a small restaurant in Mar
ket square, West Lynn. He gave up
his business and his ambition to con-
duct a big restaurant to fight for Un-
Gle Sam, enlisting at Syracuse, N. Y,
soon after America entered the wal
and was assigned to Company L of
the T~wenty-third infantry.
Early in July, 1918, his division
went lover the top" for the first time,
near Very.
The story of Sergeant Korgis' feat is
told in the Stars and Stripes, on the
authority of the captain of his COM
pany.
ut was in a deep, inaccessible dug
out that n high German commander
was found-the one the Yankee regi-
ment concerned in his capture believes
to have been a major general" the
story goes. Certainly 80 men guarded
him as if he were very precious to the
German army, and he was whirled
away in an auto to a high French
headquarters as if he might have in
formation important enough to seek
without a moments waste of time.
His Bag of 256 Boches.
"But no prisoner capture was more
impressive than the bag of 256 boches,
including eight officers, whose meek
and painless surrender vas negotiated
on the first day by a single Yankee
sergeant. The sergeant is only five feet
high and his name is Hercules. Sergt.
Hercules Korgis, T~wenty-third in
fantry, lived up to the reputation of
his given name by walking into a large
dugout, extracting therefrom six Ger
man officers and 250 soldiers, and
marching them back, under a small es-
oort 70 tho rouipnoptol nriSop oooa
obliging them to police the field Of
wounded men on tine way.
Sergt. Hercules Korgis is a Greek
by birth. He was in the Greek war
that preceded the present explosion of
Europe, and he was gay with many
medals when he went to America and
settled down in West Lynn, Mass.
1.-THE first morning of the advance
Sergeant Korgis was shot through the
neck by a German machine gun, and,
thus wounded, he was taken prisoner.
He was borne off into an easily de-
Tended, well-munitioned little ravine,
where a whole German company lay
unnoticed by the Yankees, who swept
by them and far beyond. AS the day
wore On these Germans say that they
were trapped, but they also saw that
they could make their captors pay a
heavy price for their final submission.
Perst AIDED Them to Surrender.
Sergeant Korgis, who speaks a
smattering of half a dozen languages,
drew on all the German he knew for
an eloquent h%arangue that carried the
day. Early In the afternoon they de-
cided to surrender, and sent him forth
to negotiate their safe passage to the
rear.
"With his wound dressed, but still
paining him, with mud and blood all
over him, he was a Withholding envoy
when he ran into some French SOL
We're all for shooting him then and
there. He dissuaded them, pursued
and caught up with some stray Amer
leans from his own outfit, laid the
case before them, and, led by one Cor
porla Wiley, they went over for the
formal surrender.
There was one nervous, excited ex-
change of shots between n unruly
German machine gunner and one dis
trustful Yankee before the whole 265
marched out of the ravine and were
escorted by the sergeant to regimental
headquarters. There his own officers
apounced on the sergeant and had him
sent back in the ambulance to the field
hospital. His wound had been well
dressed by a German surgeon, who
later became one of his prisoners"
Sergeant Korgis has not yet. been
recognized by the American army for
his deed, beyond the regular citations
for bravery. Officers of the Second di-
vision and friends in New England are
working to obtain a Congressional
medal for him.