CHESTER F. HAMILTON
The Pershing Trophy is awarded each year to the highest individual scorer in the National Trophy Rifle Team Match held at Camp Perry, Ohio. This year 132 teams competed, and when the last target was inspected individual honors went to Sergeant First Class Chester Hamilton of the Second Army team. Hamilton, a good-looking, crew-cut veteran of 10 years' Army service, used the M-1 rifle with a special small aperture sight to squeeze off a near-perfect 249 points out of a possible 250.
Ches Hamilton has always liked guns. Growing up in Altoona, Pa. he plinked at tin cans with a .22. He joined the Army when he was 17, found himself using an M-1 in earnest in Korea's Pork Chop Hill sector. On May 15, 1953 enemy machine gunners caught his patrol, sent Hamilton staggering back to his line with severe back and arm wounds. After six months of hospitalization, he resumed marksmanship practice. Hamilton is on the range almost every day, five hours at a time, firing about 100 rounds. "Shooting is just like any other sport," he says, "it takes steady effort. There's no such thing as a born sharpshooter."
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