From Grokipedia
Full articleJakob Rosenfeld (January 11, 1903 – April 22, 1952), known in China as General Luo Shengte, was an Austrian-Jewish physician and urologist who fled Nazi persecution to Shanghai in 1939 and became a key medical figure in the Chinese Communist armed forces during the Second Sino-Japanese War and the Chinese Civil War. Born in Lemberg (now Lviv, Ukraine) to a family of Austro-Hungarian military background, Rosenfeld trained in medicine at the University of Vienna, specializing in urology and gynecology before his arrest by the Nazis in 1938, followed by imprisonment in Dachau and Buchenwald concentration camps.
Upon arriving in China amid Japanese occupation, Rosenfeld volunteered his services to the New Fourth Army, establishing field hospitals and treating wounded soldiers and civilians in harsh conditions, which earned him the rank of general and appointment as health minister for the Shanxi-Hebei-Henan-Shandong border region's provisional government. His efforts reportedly saved tens of thousands of lives through innovations in sanitation, surgery, and epidemic control, laying foundational elements for the People's Republic of China's medical infrastructure after 1949. Despite his contributions being celebrated in China as those of an internationalist hero, Rosenfeld faced visa denials to return post-victory due to the Korean War and relocated to Israel, where he continued medical work until his death from heart disease.
In brief
Rosenfeld was a urologist until history made him a refugee. Shanghai was the first stop; the army hospitals were the vocation.
Chinese memory kept him as Luo Shengte, a foreign doctor in a general's rank. He died only a few years after the war he had worked through.
Photographs
Hero photograph: Wikimedia Commons
