The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting the Silver Star to Private First Class Charles R. King (MCSN: 345041), United States Marine Corps, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity while serving with the Third Battalion, First Marines, FIRST Marine Division, during action against enemy Japanese forces on Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands, on the night of October 23, 1942. Abandoning a position of comparative safety in the midst of a hostile tank attack at the mouth of the Matanikau River, Private First Class King, with courageous disregard for his own personal safety, ran a fierce gauntlet of Japanese machine-gun fire in order to drag a wounded comrade out of the path of an approaching tank. Although he himself received a severe knee injury in the course of the act, he, nevertheless, succeeded in removing the helpless man from a position of immediate danger, thereby saving the life of another at great risk to himself.