The three burials of George Dilboy, honored by four US presidents

In 2005 it was released in cinemas, one of the most important films of its time. It was called "the three burials of Melkiades Estrada".

According to the script, Estrada, a Mexican illegal immigrant, is accidentally killed by Norton, a US border police officer, and the authorities "bury" the case. Perkins, a friend of the deceased, kidnaps Norton, digs up Estrada and crosses the Mexican border to bury him in his village.

Melkiades Estrada lived a difficult life and not even his death offered him the peace he was looking for. Do you think that only happens in movies? By analogy, one could say that the death of Estrada and especially what followed has much in common with the story of a Greek-American, born in Smyrna.

The story of World War I hero George Dilboy, who breathed his last on the battlefield, but needed three burials to rest. His story is hard. And even he is involved in it Kemal Ataturk.

George Dilvois was born in Alatsata, Izmir, on February 5, 1896. When little George was just 12 years old, his father immigrated to the United States and settled in Somerville, Massachusetts. His goal was to find a good job and create the conditions to welcome the rest of his family. He worked at Massachusetts General Hospital and gradually began to go to USA all members of his family.

Little George arrived there in January 1910. But he did not stay in the United States for many years. In 1912 he returned to Greece to fight as a volunteer in the Balkan Wars. He then returned to the United States to finish school. After graduation he worked for a while and then enlisted voluntarily in the US Army.

He took part in the 1916-1917 Border War with Mexico and in the autumn of 1917 was promoted to the 26th Infantry Division of the US Army Western Front. World War I..

George Dilboy, as the Americans called him, served in the 103rd Infantry Regiment of the 26th US Division on its front. France. In July 1918, shortly before the end of the Great War, the Dilboy unit was ordered to occupy the railway station of the city of Boures in northern France, during the Second Battle of the Marne against the Germans.

According to what has become known, Dilvois, who was always distinguished for his bravery in battles, together with some of their comrades-in-arms tried to seize a German machine gun. There he was seriously injured. Before he breathed his last, however, he managed to kill two German machine gunners in which he fired as many grenades as he had with him and to make the occupation task easier for his comrades-in-arms as the other two machine guns hurried to disappear.

Dilboy's sacrifice did not go unnoticed, and the commander of the US Expeditionary Force, General John Persing, ranked Dilboy "one of the ten greatest heroes who died on the battlefields of France and displayed supernatural heroism and bravery."

In a letter to the deceased's father, Antonios Dilboy, General George Brigadier stated: "A descendant of the tribe of Xenophon and Leonidas has demonstrated his right to speak equally with those heroic souls. Under states of submission and faith in his adopted homeland (America) he overthrew the present, displaying those heroic qualities of his Greek ancestors, from whom he comes ".

On January 19, 1919 he was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor.

Dilboys was originally buried with military honors in the allied cemetery of Argonne in France.

In 1921, however, and while his family had returned from the US and relocated to Alatsata in Smyrna, asked the American government to mediate so that the bones of the hero be transported from France to Izmir in order to be buried in his particular homeland.

The request of the family was accepted and so after the exhumation, the coffin of Dilboy, which was wrapped with the star, first arrived in Chios with a US destroyer and from there passed to Smyrna. The second burial took place on July 10, 1922 and it is said that the carriage with the coffin to Alatsata was accompanied by more than 15.000 people.

In the dramatic events of 1922, when the Turks entered Alatsata, they destroyed everything they found in front of them while they did not hesitate to desecrate Dilboy's tomb and remove the US flag. As expected, this provoked a strong reaction from the US diplomatic mission, which demanded explanations. The issue of desecration of the tomb reached the US Congress, while the then US President Warren Harding demanded and received an official apology from the government of Kemal Ataturk.

After all the proceedings, the Kemalist regime allowed the Americans to pick up Dilboy's body and transport it to the United States. For this reason an American ship arrived in Izmir and transported it to the United States.

George Dilboy's third and final burial took place in Arlington Military Cemetery. The then President of the USA, Calvin Coolidge, was also there, in order to honor the hero of the First World War.

Another element that makes Dilboy's story even more dramatic has to do with the Medal of Honor awarded to him after his death. This had ended up in the hands of his sister, who after the destruction of Smyrna remained permanently in Crete. During World War II, the Nazis looted her house and took away Dilboy's medal.

A few years after the end of the war, Dilboy's stolen medal was found. In April 1999, by order of the then President of the United States, the medal was awarded at all costs to his nephew George Rozakis!

George Dilvois was honored by a total of four American presidents. By Woodrow Wilson, Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Bill Clinton. Public buildings have been named in his honor and statues have been erected in the USA. In Greece there are streets named after him, in Nea Smyrni, in Byron, Chios and Heraklion of Crete and a statue of him in the homonymous square of Nea Erithraia.

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