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Show SERGEANT YORK ISIKTH Valor Acclaimed at Banquet, Ban-quet, He Accepts Honors Unostentatiously. XEW YORK, May 23. Sergeant Al-vin Al-vin C. York, who received the congressional con-gressional medal of honor for the mightiest single-handed achievement of the war, in which lie killed twenty Germans, Ger-mans, took 132 more prisoners and put thirty-six machine gun nests out of business in the Argonue, heard himself proclaimed the "greatest soldier in history" his-tory" at a dinner of the Tennessee society so-ciety in his honor tonight. Y'ork, second elder in the Church of Christ and Christian Union in the little Tennessee village of Pall Mall, was flanked on either side at the speaker's table by Major General George Duncan, Dun-can, who commanded tho Eighty-second division, in which Y'ork fought, and Vice Admiral Albert Cleaves, commander com-mander of the cruiser and transport force of tho navy. A telegram from! the secretary of war was read to him, in which Mr. Baker asked that his "very sincerest regards bo personally conveyed to the distinguished soldier." When it came Y'ork 's turn to stand up and address the diners, he showed his modest simplicity: "I guess you all understand that I'm just a soldier and not a speaker," he said. "I'm just a soldier boy but I want to thank the society and I want vou all to know that what you all have done for me is highly appreciated, and I shall never forget it. Thank you very much." "Sergeant York's deeds are of the character that go down in history, and make our boys patriots in time of stress," said General Duncan. "lie is not only a very unpretentious soldier, but an unassuming, modest man. His achievement was tho most outstanding act of gallantry, not only that this world war has produced, but that 1 have ever heard of. He is not only modest, absolutely, but unabashed, unafraid un-afraid iu the presence of any gathering or of any enemy." The first words of the German major captured by York when he rounded up 13'J prisoners in the Argonno forest n as told by General Duncan: "British!" asked the German major. "American," said Sergeant York. "Good Lord!" exclaimed the major. |