George Patton, even worse than you thought

You’re (probably) familiar with the story about how General George Patton slapped a soldier for claiming to be suffering from shell shock. But it gets worse. According to war correspondent George Seldes, in his autobiography Witness to a Century, in his anger, Patton 1) slapped the wrong guy and 2) exclaimed “There is no shell shock! It was invented by Jews!”

Afterwords
Seldes didn’t see the incident itself but says he heard it from another correspondent, Noel Banks, who was an eyewitness. Seldes, not as famous as he used to be, was perhaps the first press critic. Starting out as a cub reporter in 1909, he was appalled at how little truth found its way into print, but, not too surprisingly, he doesn’t tell us everything himself. His parents were Russian Jews (Seldes doesn’t tell us this). His father, a passionate free-thinker, founded a utopian community called “Alliance Colony” in New Jersey. House guests included Maxim Gorky, Emma Goldman, and the once legendary actress Alla Nazimova.*

Seldes’ introduction to the seamy side of the newspaper trade occurred early in his career, when he covered the trial of the son of the owner of one Pittsburgh’s largest department stores,† accused of attempted rape by one of the stores’ sales girls. His story never ran, but the department store greatly increased its advertising in Seldes’ paper.