Did J.D. Salinger Fight in World War II?

J. D. Salinger was an American writer best known for his novel, The Catcher in the Rye. Salinger was born and raised in New York City and was drafted into World War II after the attack on Pearl Harbor. At this point, Salinger had published several short stories in various journals and had been developing .

Salinger carried draft pages of his novel with him during the war. Several chapters were in his backpack when he stormed Omaha Beach on D-Day. Salinger served with the Counter-Intelligence Corps of the Fourth Infantry Division. He was briefly hospitalized in 1945 for “battle fatigue”.

J. D. Salinger finished The Catcher in the Rye in 1950 and it was published in 1951.

More about J.D. Salinger:

• Salinger was a famously private person who lived as a recluse for the majority of his life. He published only one novel and several collections of short stories and novellas.
• During World War II, Salinger befriended Ernest Hemingway, who was working as a war correspondent in Paris at the time.
• As a young man, J. D. Salinger dated Oona O'Neill, the daughter of Eugene O'Neill, a famous playwright. Ms. O'Neill eventually married Charlie Chaplin.