Jean Gordon

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, allegedly beginning years before the war and continuing behind the front lines of wartime Europe. 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. Early life Jean Gordon's mother, Louise Raynor Ayer, daughter of the textile industrialist Frederick Ayer and his first wife Cornelia Wheaton, was a half-sister of Patton's wife Beatrice. Her father Donald Gordon, a well-known Boston lawyer, died of leukemia when Jean was 8 years old. Gordon, described as "a quiet but witty girl, highly intelligent and beautiful," and "a vivacious and lovely brunette," was prominent in prewar Boston high society, being a member of women's organizations such as the Junior League and the Vincent Club. The same age as Patton's younger daughter Ruth Ellen and her best friend, she spent many of her vacations with the Pattons and was a bridesmaid in the weddings of both Patton girls. According to writer Nancy J. Morris, Gordon's long romantic involvement with General Patton began during one such vacation in the 1930s. Patton was posted in Hawai'i, and Gordon visited the family there. Morris writes: "When Beatrice's niece, Jean Gordon, visited, Patton began a flirtation with the girl. Gordon was a recent Boston debutante, pretty, lively, and the best friend of Ruth Ellen, the Pattons' daughter. Unwisely, Beatrice did not accompany Patton and Jean on a horse-buying trip to a neighbor island, and when the two returned, it was clear to Beatrice that the flirtation had become an affair." Morris quotes Ruth Ellen Patton's memories of her mother's reaction via biographer Carlo D'Este's research into Ruth Ellen's personal papers. By this telling, Beatrice told her daughter "Your father needs me. He doesn't know it right now, but he needs me. In fact, right now, he needs me more than I need him....