Friend tells story in Washington Post
George Serkedakis and Ken Myers, both members of the 394th Inf. Reg., of the 99th Infantry Division, recently were featured in the Washington Post in a story by staff writer Steve Hendrix.
The story began with the men reminiscing about their ride this year in the Memorial Day Parade in Washington, D.C. Myers is 87 and Serkedakis is 93.
The rest of the Post story told of their remarkable reunion, once on the battlefield in Belgium, and again three decades later in a traffic jam in downtown Washington, D.C.
Serkedakis tells about getting wounded in December 1944, as the truck he was riding in encountered six German tanks in a village.
Part of his skull was blown away and he was left to die. He has foggy memories of being carried, an argument, a rough ride, and cold.
After months of recuperation both in England and the States, he was discharged from the Army.
He returned to civilian life, worked in the family restaurant, drove a cab, and raised a family.
Myers tells the other side of the story. He was one of the corpsmen who was ordered to leave Serkedakis for dead.
Instead, he disobeyed orders, hiding the wounded soldier for more than a week before getting the chance to take him to a field hospital.
In the 1970s, as Serkedakis was driving a cab in downtown Washington, a big man in a pickup asked him if he remembered the name Ken Myers, the 99th Infantry, or the Battle of the Bulge.
He didn't remember Myers, but the 99th and Battle of the Bulge struck a chord.
The two spent four hours talking on a Washington street corner.
Between the two of them, they pieced the story together, and Serkedakis finally knew who to thank for saving his life.
Now, the two friends meet regularly to retell the story of two chance encounters that brought them together.
