The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting Legion of Merit to Boatswain’s Mate Second Class John C. Cullen, United States Coast Guard, for exceptionally meritorious conduct in the performance of outstanding services to the Government of the United States while on patrol at Long Island, New York, on the night of 13 June 1942. When several Nazi saboteurs bearing boxes of TNT and other destructive apparatus landed on the beach at Amagansett, Boatswain’s Mate Second Class Cullen, unarmed and helpless against their menacing threat cleverly allayed their suspicions and thwarted their subversive intentions by promptly accepting a proffered bribe then sounding an alarm that led to their eventual capture. Subsequently volunteering as member of a searching party, he remained on the beach all night and after apprehension of the enemy agents, furnished vital and incriminating testimony before a special military commission conducting trial. His keen presence of mind and discerning judgment in a grave emergency undoubtedly prevented the successful culmination of hostile intrigue designed to sabotage our national war effort.