Joseph Heine

Joseph von Heine (28 November 1803 to 4 November 1877) was a German medical doctor who rose to a high civil post in the Bavarian health service in the Rheinkreis. He was the son of the orthopedist Johann Georg Heine, who left Würzburg and his family in 1829 to settle in the Netherlands. When his father wanted him to take over a hospital in Brussels, Joseph declined and instead completed his medical education in other European cities. He was troubled to learn that his father was pursuing branches of medicine he was not qualified for, and the two met only once, in 1838, shortly before the father died. Four years later Joseph published a harsh criticism of his father for abandoning his family and trying unscholarly methods of treatment, while also praising his merits as an outstanding orthopedist. A local history by Hans Hekler describes him as a doctor, politician and patron of the arts.