 During the brief Russian-Turkish siege (1799), while in the vicinity of the San Giacomo theater in Corfu, a cannon ball fired from a Russian vessel fell beside young Voulgaris without immediately exploding.He immediately grabbed the fuse and then neutralized it, thus saving the theater and a whole French military detachment which passed nearby with heavy weapons and ammunition.French General Louis François Jean Chabot, a friend of Napoleon, in order to honor his bravery, enlisted him in the French army.