Bruno Friedrich Beheim Schwarzbach (or Beheim-Schwarzbach), a travelling opthalmologist, was the son of Alexander Friedrich Franz Beheim Schwarzbach and Henriette Wilhelmine Emilie Grasselt. He qualified as Doctor of Medicine (MD) at Würzburg, Germany, in 1880 with a thesis entitled "Ueber Vorkommen und Behandlung von Augenkrankheiten in aussereuropäschen Ländern (On the prevention and treatment of eye diseases in countries outside Europe; Würzburg, 1880, 46 pp). That same year he became a Licentiate of the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow. He came to the Cape Colony in 1881, where he was licensed to practice in September that year. That same month he read a paper on "The human eye and how to guard it" before the South African Philosophical Society in Cape Town. The paper was not published. Meanwhile he may have visited New Zealand, for in 1882 he published a book on Die Maoris auf Neuseeland.

Years later he published two lectures under the title Consumption: how to avoid it, and weak eyes (London, 1897, 107 pp). He may have left the country for a number of years, probably to go to Australia, for he is not listed in the medical directories of the Cape Colony in 1893 and 1897. In 1900 he applied for registration as a medical practitioner in Natal. It appears that he let this registration lapse, for he is not listed in the Natal medical register of 1904. However, in 1905, then residing in Durban, he applied for re-registration in Natal. He left for the Cape Colony again soon afterwards, for Bruno Beheim-Schwarzbach was listed as a medical practitioner in the Cape Colony, residing at East London, in 1907. In 1911 he wrote a book (in German) about a sunny outlook on life. He was a naturalized British citizen and was married to Carola Stockmar, but they were divorced in 1904.

List of sources:

Beheim-Schwarzbach, Martin (son). Retrieved from http://biographien.kulturimpuls.org/detail.php?&id=49 on 22 September 2020.

Cape of Good Hope Government Gazette, 9 January 1885, pp. 41-45: List of licensed medical practitioners in the Cape Colony.

FamilySearch: Bruno Friedrich Beheim-Schwarzbach. https://www.familysearch.org/en/tree/person/details/M454-5SR

Google scholar. http://scholar.google.co.za/ , publications by B. Schwarzbach.

Medical and pharmacy register for the Colony of the Cape of Good Hope, 1907.

National Automated Archival Information Retrieval System (NAAIRS). http://national.archives.gov.za/naairs.htm Documents relating to Schwarzbach, B. Beheim / Schwarzbach, B.B. / Schwarzbach, B. / Dr Schwarzbach.

National Union Catalogue, pre-1956 imprints. London: Mansell, 1968-1980.

South African Philosophical Society. Transactions, 1881, Vol. 3, p. x.

Compiled by: C. Plug

Last updated: 2025-11-17 10:36:22