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Few people have gotten as much out of life as <em>Charles “Chick” King</em>; fewer yet have been endowed with that indomitable spirit which made him the complete master of every enterprise he undertook. This latter quality of Chick’s could not be better stated than in the following words from his class biography in the <em>Howitzer</em> for 1928:</p>
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“If Chick wants to do a thing, you can rest assured that he will employ every means in his power to perform it. It is that spirit which has caused Chick to make lasting friendships with other strong-willed and determined people, and to leave them with the assurance that all through life he will be putting his whole energy into the enterprises towards which his spirit directs him”</p>
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Chick did just that from the hot July day in 1924 when he first entered West Point as a plebe from his native state of Oklahoma, till that other summer’s day twenty years later when he gave his life for his country in the early days of the Normandy Invasion.</p>
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Chick’s complete absorption in the things he liked was exemplified by his love of hunting. Perhaps the happiest days of Chick’s life were those he spent in hunting ducks at Sycamore Landing, his mother’s place on the Potomac River a few miles below Washington. But Chick was not content with hunting as the ordinary sportsman does it. Instead, his hours in the blind were preceded by endless hours spent in carving, shaping, weighting and painting his own superb decoys; by further endless hours in personal preparation to his exacting standards of his blinds, boats, guns and gear; and by yet further endless hours in improving his skill as a shot on the skeet range.</p>
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Fortunately for Chick’s family, for his friends, and for the Army, nothing pleased Chick more than to arouse the interest of others in the things that excited his own interest. At Plattsburg Barracks, where he served from 1935 to 1937, Chick taught the men of his company cabinet-making, to give them a means of recreation during their off-duty hours in the long, cold, winter months, and to enable them at the same time to make valuable Christmas presents for their relatives and friends at little or no cost to themselves, Again at West Point, where he served as a Tactical Officer from 1937 to 1941, Chick installed a cabinet-making shop in the rear of his quarters, where he taught the fine points of woodworking both to his fellow officers and to the cadets of his company.</p>
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Chick was convinced long before it became established training doctrine that shooting at moving targets was not only stimulating to the interest of his men, but was excellent training tor aerial gunnery. Accordingly, he devised moving airplanes, tanks, troops and ducks for his small-bore range at Plattsburg, with the result that his company was always battling for the top shooting honors of the regiment. Later at West Point, for the same reason, he built the first skeet range and organized the first skeet team in the history of the Academy, with equally good results.</p>
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Chick was never happier than when his wife and old schoolgirl sweetheart, Karla, whom he had married in Washington, D. C. on December 26, 1931, while a student at the Company Officers’ Course at Fort Benning, became a crack shot herself under his skilled tutelage and was able to join him as a full partner in his hunting adventures, as she already was in everything else. In fact, Chick’s family, which in addition to Karla and himself, was made up of his daughter, Jan Allison, who was born in Hawaii on December 22, 1932, and his two sons, Chippy (Charles, Jr.) also born in Hawaii on September 18, 1934, and Donny (Donald Christian Heurich) who was born at Plattsburg on April 2, 1937, was the center of his whole existence. Seldom are men able to spend so much of their time within their immediate family circle and with such contentment as Chick felt when in his own home with his family round about him. Chick’s happiest hours at Sycamore Landing were shared with the members of his family, and one of his great disappointments on embarking for combat duty was the fact that he had to leave just as Chippy, the older of his boys, was coming of an age to join him in the duck blinds on a wintry morning when the hunting was at its best.</p>
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It is easy to understand why Chick was a constant inspiration to the men under him, whether they were cadets at West Point or enlisted men of his command. His intense interest in the progress of his men, and his ability to interest them in their own development, made Chick equally outstanding as a troop officer and as an instructor. When he was still a relatively young officer at Schofield Barracks in the early thirties, Chick had already won these words of praise from a seasoned old-time top sergeant who had learned to judge officers, good and bad, over a period of many years:</p>
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“Lieutenant King is an outstanding officer and will go far in his Army career. Of all the officers that I have ever served under in my long Army life, he more than any other understands and has at heart the problems of the enlisted man.”</p>
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It was small wonder then, to learn in the Summer of 1941 that Chick, who was then a Major, had been chosen as one of three tactical officers from West Point (the others being Colonel Richard R. Coursey and Colonel Felix A. Todd. Jr.,) to proceed to Fort Benning to organize the Infantry Officer Candidate School at that post. This school was destined almost immediately to grow by leaps and bounds and to establish a high reputation throughout the Army both for itself and for those responsible for its development; becoming in fact, a model for all the other officer candidate schools of our expanding wartime Army. A successful and important feature which Chick introduced at Benning, and which is now employed in rating cadets at West Point, was a method whereby the officer candidates of each company rated one another’s fitness for a commission. Chick’s ever present enthusiasm for his men was displayed by his brief but expressive statement in a letter written in April of 1942, that “I wish you could see some of my officer candidates!” Naturally, they gave their best for an instructor with an attitude like that!</p>
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Because of his record at Fort Benning, which brought him his commission as Lieutenant Colonel on July 13, 1942, Chick was almost detailed in the Summer of 1942 to organize an overseas officer candidate school, but was successful in his plea that such an assignment would kill his chances of duty with troops, which was still his first choice by far. Before finally achieving that objective, however, there lay ahead of him a year and a half of duty in the G-2 section of A.G.F. Headquarters in Washington, during which he won his full colonelcy on June 19, 1943.</p>
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At last, in March of 1944, following his completion of the abbreviated wartime course at the Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, Chick received his long awaited orders for duty with troops. By this time, however, he had demonstrated such proficiency in the field of military intelligence, that instead of being given command of a regiment he was assigned to the important post of G-2 of the VII Corps. So it was for this post that he sailed, in the company of his brother Ludlow; who was Chemical Warfare Officer of the same Corps and Chick’s bosom companion till the day of his death.</p>
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Such were Chick’s courage and his enthusiasm for his prospective role as a participant in the invasion of Europe that he would never have flinched nor wavered had he known for a surety that he was bidding goodbye to his family and friends forever. Nor would the same qualities permit him to rest in the relative security of his Corps headquarters once he was safely landed on the shores of Normandy. Instead, he was ever where he could gain the latest and most reliable information of the disposition and strength of the enemy forces. It was this disregard of personal safety in the interest of the common cause which cost Chick his life, when, in approaching the banks of the Ollonde River near the village of La Riviere to participate in the interrogation of a group of German prisoners on the evening of June 22, 1944, he drew fatal fire from a German position across the river.</p>
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So came a hero’s death to a loving husband and father, a true friend, a fine sportsman, and a brave and loyal soldier. As Chick’s Commander in Chief, and sometimes companion of the duck blinds. General of the Army George C. Marshall, wrote to Mrs. King upon receipt of word of Chick’s death in action,</p>
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“He was a fine sportsman as well as a fine soldier and he gave his life at a high moment in a great enterprise”.</p>
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Another of his hunting companions of happier days. General Omar N. Bradley, Commanding General of the 12th Army Group in Europe, similarly wrote, “I counted Chick as one of my very best friends as well as one of our most capable officers.”</p>
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The citation for Chick’s Legion of Merit, which was presented to Charles, Jr. in the presence of the other members of Chick’s family on November 13, 1944, by Major General C. F. Thompson, the Commanding General of the Military District of Washington, reads as follows:</p>
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Legion of Merit</p>
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“For exceptionally meritorious conduct in the performance of outstanding services as Assistant Chief of Staff. G-2, Seventh Corps, from 7 April 1944 to 22 June 1944. Colonel King evaluated the voluminous intelligence information accumulated and, at the same time, completed plans for the organization of his section. His keen mind, sound judgment aqd his untiring efforts enabled him to carry out this difficult assignment in an amazingly short time, and he was able to devote his great organizing ability to the final completion of plans for the invasion. His judgment and conclusions in furnishing his Commanding General and members of the staff his analysis of the unfolding situation were fully confirmed by conditions found to exist on ‘D’ Day and immediately thereafter. Subsequent to the landing, his eagerness and enthusiasm in securing the very best and latest information of the enemy often took him to exposed positions. Colonel King was killed in action on 22 June while accompanying a patrol to bring in enemy prisoners. His devotion to duty, and his resourcefulness contributed materially to the success of the campaign on the Cherbourg Peninsula.”</p>
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It was thus fitting that after the objective for which Chick and so many others gave their lives had been won, and VE-Day had come and gone, the last official act of the VII Corps in Europe should be the placing of a wreath by the acting corps commander, Brigadier General William B. Palmer, on Chick’s grave at Ste. Mere Egltse Cemetery on June 22, 1945, the first anniversary of his death. It was equally fitting that the Military Intelligence Service Center at Oberursel, Germany, should be named Camp King, in his honor.</p>
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May his children follow in his footsteps, but be spared the trials of war which brought death to their father!</p>
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<em>—L. W. F.</em></p>
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