Samson Raphael Hirsch was the son of the Jewish physician Raphael Hirsch and his wife Lina, née Löwenthal.1 He was named after his great-grandfather Samson Raphael Hirsch (1808-1880), the Reform rabbi who became known as the founder of Neo-Orthodoxy. His aunt, the internist Rahel Hirsch (1870-1953) and likewise an emigrated DGIM member, was one of the first German female physicians to attain the title of professor. Samson Hirsch's younger brother Julius (1892-1962) also studied medicine and became a recognized full professor of microbiology and hygiene in Istanbul.2
Hirsch moved to Frankfurt am Main after the early death of his father, where he attended the Kaiser-Friedrich-Gymnasium from 1901. He passed his Abitur in 1909 and began studying medicine in Heidelberg the same year. After stations in Munich and Berlin, he was licensed in Heidelberg in 1914 and received his doctorate the same year with a thesis on neurasthenic symptoms in chronic lead poisoning under Ludolf von Krehl (1861-1937).3
Hirsch's license to practice coincided with the outbreak of World War I, so he initially worked as a military doctor.
New Scientific Territory
After the end of the war, Hirsch accepted a position as senior physician in the internal medicine department at the Sandhof Municipal Hospital in Frankfurt. At the same time, he became a staff member at the Institute of Pharmacology at the University of Frankfurt, where he took over as head of the X-ray department. During this time, he produced numerous scientific papers, including the first international study in 1922 demonstrating successful clinical use of theophylline in bronchial asthma.4 In another landmark study, in 1923, he and Joseph Berberich demonstrated the first successful performance of angiography on the living using strontium bromide.5
Hirsch later settled in Frankfurt am Main as a specialist in internal diseases. He also worked as an expert witness for the Reich Insurance Institution for Salaried Employees and for the Appeals Board of the War Injured Welfare between 1927 and 1933.6 He lived at Brentanostraße 14 together with his wife Erna, née Falk (b. 1903).
Displacement and Life in Exile
Hirsch faced repression by the National Socialists from 1933 onwards. He lost his employment as an expert and was subsequently also dismissed from the hospital. He decided to emigrate to Belgium in 1938 – probably under the impression of the revocation of his license to practice medicine ordered on September 30, 1938. His German citizenship was revoked on March 19, 1940, based on § 2 of the "Law on the Revocation of Naturalizations and the Revocation of German Citizenship of July 14, 1933" ("Gesetz über den Widerruf von Einbürgerungen und die Aberkennung der deutschen Staatsangehörigkeit vom 14.07.1933")7
The Hirsches had to go into hiding, when Belgium was occupied by Wehrmacht troops in 1940. Both survived and remained in Belgium after the end of the war. Hirsch settled in Brussels in 1945, where he worked as a physician, scientist, and publicist; he obtained a position at the Institute of Pathology at the University of Brussels, among other things.8 The more than 50 publications that have been produced since then, attest to a high level of research activity even after World War II. Hirsch's scientific interests and activities were wide-ranging, with his main focus being on cardiology and cardiovascular diseases.
Other interests included philosophy and music in particular. Hirsch was also a member of the Bnei Briss Lodge and for a time president of the Hermann Cohen Lodge in Frankfurt; when living in Belgium, he acted as a liaison between the two lodges.9
Hirsch died during a visit in Rome, where he attended the 3rd European Congress of Cardiology, just prior to his 70th birthday.
