Kosch, Raphael:

By: Isidore Singer , Frederick T. Haneman

German physician and deputy; born at Lissa, Posen, Oct. 5, 1803; died at Berlin March 27, 1872. Educated at the University of Königsberg (M.D. 1826), he became assistant at the surgical-ophthalmological clinic there and commenced to practise in 1832.

Kosch soon became interested in the political life of Prussia. In 1848 he was sent as representative from Königsberg to the Prussian National-Versammlung, where he was elected a vice-president. From 1850 to 1860 he took no active part in politics, but again became interested therein in 1861, when he was elected from Königsberg to the Prussian Lower House, of which he remained a member until his death. He belonged to the party of the Left ("Fortschrittspartei"). It was partly through his energy that the oath "More Judaico" was repealed in 1869.

Kosch, who was unmarried, bequeathed his fortune to an orphan asylum of Königsberg.