Zoltán Herskovics (later: Prince Hervey)

Zoltán HERSKOVICS (later: Zoltán PRINCE HERVEY), born on August 25^th, 1913 in Gálszécs, Zemplén, Hungary/Austro-Hungarian Empire [Sečovce/(Czecho-)Slovakia] (entitled residency ("heimatberechtigt") for Miskolc/Hungary, citizenship 1938: Hungary), son of Paul Herskovics (merchant, deceased), initially lived in Vienna's 9^th district, Lazarettgasse 29/8, and Gruenentorgasse 17/3/12a, from fall 1934 on in Vienna's 8^th district, Schloesselgasse 22/11. His legal guardian, Jakob Princz (merchant), lived in Miskolc/Hungary. He had graduated from grammar school in Miskolc in 1932 and subsequently enrolled at the Medical School in the spring term of 1932.

Zoltán Herskovics was last enrolled in spring term 1937 in the 5^th year of his studies at the Medical Faculty of the University of Vienna ("Absolutorium" was certified on July 18^th, 1938) and was already in the final examinations ("Rigorosen") stage in 1938. After a lengthy period of uncertainty, he was able to complete his studies after all and graduated on July 21^st, 1938, under numerous symbolic discriminatory measures in a “non-Aryan graduation” ("Nichtarierpromotion"), while at the same time being banned from working in the entire German Reich.

Zoltán Herskovics had to flee Vienna and, as he was a Hungarian or Czechoslovakian citizen, was able to move to his relatives in Miskolc/Hungary at the beginning of September 1938, where he made further preparations for his emigration. He finally managed to emigrate from Hungary via Genoa/Italy to the USA in 1940, arriving in New York on March 4^th, 1940, on the "SS Washington". He initially lived with his cousin Frederick Morgarten in Chelsea, MA, and was mustered into the U.S. Army on October 16^th and then served as a Captain in the Army from 1942-1946. In the meantime, he had completed a one-year rotating internship at Chelsea Memorial Hospital, Chelsea, MA, and was resident physician at Long Island Hospital, Boston, MA, for two and a half years before briefly taking over the practice of Dr. Werner Muhlfelder in Chatham, Columbia County, NY, in 1944.

In the USA, he married Ernestine Hervey (widowed Drimer, born January 30^th, 1913, in Vienna) in Boston on August 22^nd, 1942. She worked as a laboratory technician at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, had already emigrated from Vienna via Hamburg to the USA in the summer and arrived in New York on August 4^th, 1938. Zoltán Herskovics (Herskowitz/Herskovits) took her name on marriage and henceforth called himself Zoltan Prince Hervey. On June 13^th, 1943 a daughter was born in Hartford, in 1946 son Richard Lawrence Hervey (later lived in Manchester) and in 1949 daughter Lauretta N. Hervey (married Pearson, later lived in Norwich, VT).
Zoltan P. Hervey became a U.S. citizen in Boston in 1944 and from the late 1940s lived and worked in East Hartford, CT, where he worked both at Mt. Sinai Hospital and as a general practitioner in private practice for nearly twenty years (as a consultant also at St. Francis Hospital, Hartford Hospital and Manchester Memorial Hospital), while his wife worked at Connecticut Valley Hospital in Middletown as an occupational therapist.

Dr. Zoltan P. Hervey, née Herskovics, died at the age of only 55 on January 25^th, 1969, in Hartford and was buried at Rose Hill Memorial Park in Rocky Hill, Hartford, CT/USA. His wife, who was almost the same age, died at the age of 83 on June 1^st, 1996.

Lit.: Archive of the University of Vienna/enrollment forms ("Nationale") MED 1932-1938, graduation registry ("Promotionsprotokoll") MED 13 (1929-1941) No. 4094; Municipal and Provincial Archives of Vienna; New York State Journal of Medicine 1944; POSCH 2009, 370; information by courtesy of Dr. Barbara Sauer, Vienna 03/2019; REITER-ZATLOUKAL/SAUER 2025, www.ancestry.de.

Herbert Posch, Katharina Kniefacz