Jean Gordon (Red Cross)

Jean Gordon
Born(1915-02-04)February 4, 1915[1]
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
DiedJanuary 8, 1946(1946-01-08) (aged 30)[1]
New York, New York, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
OccupationAmerican Red Cross Clubmobile Staff Assistant ("donut girl")

Jean Gordon (February 4, 1915 – January 8, 1946) was an American socialite and a Red Cross worker during World War II. A niece by marriage of General George S. Patton, some writers claim she had a long affair with Patton,[2] allegedly beginning years before the war[3] and continuing behind the front lines of wartime Europe.[4] The published memoirs of Gordon's good friend, Patton's daughter Ruth Ellen, who also collaborated on her nephew Robert's work on the Pattons, as well as correspondence from Patton's wife, Beatrice, reveals that the family considered Gordon and Patton to have been in a romantic relationship. Patton's scholarly biographers disagree. After her lover (a junior officer) returned to his wife, and shortly after Patton died, she committed suicide.[5][6]

  1. ^ a b Steward 1993, p. 92
  2. ^ Irving 2010, p. 192
  3. ^ Patton Totten 2011, pp. 260–1
  4. ^ Irving 2010, pp. 312–13, 346, 387–8, 404, 406–7
  5. ^ The Washington Post 1946, p. 8
  6. ^ Parade 1981, p. 10