During the summer of 1937, Hersey was a secretary and gofer for Sinclair Lewis. He left that employment in the fall to apprentice at Time magazine, a business relationship that would extend through 1945. In 1939, he returned to China as a war correspondent at the Chungking bureau of Time. In this capacity, he traveled throughout China and Japan, sending dispatches of military action and interviewing important leaders. During his career, Hersey's writings appeared in Time, Life, and the New Yorker.
Hersey married twice during his lifetime and had four children. In 1940, he married Frances Ann Cannon, the daughter of a cotton goods manufacturer in Charlotte, North Carolina. They had three children: Martin Cannon, John Richard, Jr., and Baird. This marriage ended in divorce in 1958. He later married Barbara Day Addams Kaufman. They had a daughter, Brook.
Hersey published two books in 1942 and 1943: Men on Bataan and Into the Valley. Men on Bataan is an account of the fighting in the Philippines. It contains fifty stories of enlisted men, as well as chapters about General MacArthur. The book, which received positive reviews, reveals Hersey's concerns with how democracy could function in a time of war. Hersey's experience in the South Pacific and at the Battle of the Solomons led to his month-long stay on Guadalcanal. He experienced war firsthand and saw the terrible hardships that were placed on the fighting men. For helping evacuate the wounded, Hersey later received a letter of commendation from Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox. Into the Valley, published in 1943, is about the experiences of the fighting men in the Pacific Theater. Here, Hersey studied the combat soldier's reaction to danger, the war, and the enemies. He began a theme that would continue throughout his career: his study of why and how men survived under terrible conditions. Survival became a key idea in his thinking and writing.
From 1943 to 1945, Hersey worked out of Sicily and Russia. During this time, many of his writings for Life magazine were about returning veterans, the victims of war, and the occupation troops. He also wrote about John F. Kennedy's heroic experience with the PT 109, continuing his interest in survival under harsh conditions.
