Kaiser Wilhelm II enjoying a light moment with his officers.
A MR. BRUCE BARTON, THE AMERICAN EDITOR of Every Week magazine, published in his August 7, 1916 issue a “Personal Letter to the Kaiser.” It was shockingly condescending to the point of insulting to Germany and its emperor Wilhelm II. Of course, the letter was not sent, but just printed in Barton's magazine as something of an editorial. It gives us an idea of just how sleezy were the slanders directed against Germany and Germans in general at that time and how difficult it must have been for German Americans to tolerate.
In response to Barton's letter, The Fatherland published it's own “Open Letter” to him, authored by a “Proxy” for Kaiser Wilhelm. My sense is that it is the work of The Fatherland's editor, George Sylvester Viereck. I think it does an outstanding job sounding convincingly like Wilhelm; if I hadn't been told otherwise, I could easily believe it was the emperor himself, even though I, of course, am not familiar with him. Viereck was, though.
