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In 1943, Ernest C. Crocker (1888/1964), a chemist who had worked on developing poisonous gases for the US. military, was recruited for a foul-smelling task: the creation of a military-grade stink bomb. The plan was to supply this stink bomb to the French Resistance, who would use it to spray German officers to embarrass them and, in turn, reduce overall troop morale.
The substance should be persistent, “produce unmistakable evidence of extreme personal uncleanliness,” and, ideally, induce nausea. But its real purpose was psychological—to destroy morale through embarrassment.
Crocker working
After months of testing the world’s most putrid scents, Crocker finally settled upon a formula that presented a concoction of smells including vomit, rancid butter, urine, rotten eggs, foot odor, and excrement, all in one delightful spray called Who, Me?.
Crocker working
In late 1944, Crocker also developed a second formula to use against the Japanese. Concern that Japanese people might be accustomed to open sewers and the racist Western belief that they might even be immune to the stench of human waste led him to remove skatole and incorporate alpha ionone to add cadaverous notes.
Finally 600 units of Who, Me? were prepped for deployment, but the war ended before the spray saw any action.
Crocker spent the rest of his career studying smells and flavors, helping to establish sensory science and food technology as scientific fields.
The substance should be persistent, “produce unmistakable evidence of extreme personal uncleanliness,” and, ideally, induce nausea. But its real purpose was psychological—to destroy morale through embarrassment.
Crocker working
After months of testing the world’s most putrid scents, Crocker finally settled upon a formula that presented a concoction of smells including vomit, rancid butter, urine, rotten eggs, foot odor, and excrement, all in one delightful spray called Who, Me?.
Crocker working
In late 1944, Crocker also developed a second formula to use against the Japanese. Concern that Japanese people might be accustomed to open sewers and the racist Western belief that they might even be immune to the stench of human waste led him to remove skatole and incorporate alpha ionone to add cadaverous notes.
Finally 600 units of Who, Me? were prepped for deployment, but the war ended before the spray saw any action.
Crocker spent the rest of his career studying smells and flavors, helping to establish sensory science and food technology as scientific fields.
From:
technologyreview.com
mentalfloss.com
nadiaberenstein.com
and Wiki