The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting the Silver Star to Private First Class Charles W. Dieterich, Jr. (MCSN: 275312), United States Marine Corps, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity while a member of the First Battalion, Eleventh Marines, FIRST Marine Division, during action against enemy Japanese forces on Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, on October 14, 1942. When a Marine bivouac area came under intense and prolonged bombardment by a number of Japanese ships and a major caliber projectile struck an occupied dugout, Private First Class Dieterich, along with four other men, unhesitatingly set to work to rescue two Marines who had been buried under an avalanche of debris. Under continuous shellfire and aerial attack, the crew persisted for nearly an hour in digging out and removing logs until the entrapped men were unearthed. One had been killed by the shell hit, but the other, due to quick thinking and untiring efforts of Private First Class Dieterich and his comrades, was undoubtedly saved from death by suffocation.