Background Information
Nately starts off the book as a 19-year-old lieutenant, who will be "twenty next January" and who came from a very rich and respected family. (In a flashback his mother reminds him that—in contrast to such vulgar upstarts as the Astors, "whose family, I believe, still lets rooms," and the "vulgar tugboat captain" Vanderbilt -- "You are a Nately, and the Natelys have never done anything for their money.") His family originally enlisted him to serve in the Air Corps, believing the war would be over by the time he finished his training and that he would mingle with "gentlemen". Therefore, Nately could gain the pride of enlisting without actually having to fight. Instead, he mingled with Yossarian and Dunbar, and was sent overseas. He lives in a tent with McWatt next to Havermeyer's tent.
His most notable contribution to the book is his involvement with a whore, who is for the most part uninterested in him until he gave her some time to sleep. He is often filled with American optimism, shown by his desire to marry his whore and send her kid sister to a respected U.S. college. However, he is killed on a pointless mission when Dobbs flies his plane into Nately's. Nately's whore blames Yossarian and she spends the rest of the book trying to murder him.
A chapter later deleted from Catch-22 entitled 'Love, Dad' gives Nately's full name as Edward J. Nately III.
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