The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, July 2, 1926, takes pleasure in presenting the Distinguished Flying Cross to Staff Sergeant Donald E. Hamilton (ASN: 6079065), U.S. Army Air Corps, for extraordinary achievement while participating in an aerial flight, as a member of the 96th Bombardment Squadron, in flight from Concord, New Hampshire to East Brewster, Massachusetts and return on the night of 9 February 1936. having been notified that seven Civilian Conservation Corps enrollees were stranded on an ice floe in Cape Cod Bay, Staff Sergeant Hamilton served as a member of the crew of an airplane which took off during the hours of darkness, under dangerous flying conditions due to weather, and successfully located the men, dropped a message to them and reported their location, thereby being chiefly responsible for saving their lives.