Dr. Sofie (also sometimes spelled Sophie) Herzog, as she is usually known, was a colorful doctor in Brazoria for many years. “Dr. Sofie” was born in Austria in 1846. Little else is seems to be known about her Austrian family or their background, other than their last name was Daligath, or some variation of this name. When she was still very young, she married a doctor by the name of August Moritz Herzog. She had the first of their fifteen children (including three sets of twins) in 1866 in Austria. Sophie was interested in medicine and received training in the field in Austria. Her original goal may have been to help her husband, so she first earned credentials to become a midwife. Soon, however, she became inspired to study medicine on her own. After earning her medical degree in 1886, she began practicing medicine in Austria.
The Herzog family appears to have moved to the United States in the mid 1880s, first residing in New York. She was required to receive more medical education in the United States in order to be certified to practice medicine in New York. About ten years later in the 1890s, their daughter Elfenreide Marie married Randolph F. S. Prell, in Texas. Prell was a merchant of German parentage born in Brazoria. Some biographies of Sofie have her traveling to Texas first to visit the young Prell family. Sofie’s husband Moritz appears to have died in New York prior to 1890 and by 1900, she had moved to Brazoria where she was practicing medicine.
The federal census for 1900 has the Prell family living in a residence that they owned and Sofie living rented part of the Prell home out of which she ran her practice and lived. Eventually, she moved to an office near the railroad. It had a long room and a couple of other rooms, one of which she used as her bedroom. Anecdotes about her early medical practice in Brazoria include that she operated a free library in her pharmacy/medical office, using her large collection of novels. She also seemed to be fascinated by the local wildlife as another story has her identifying a strange animal that a young boy had brought in. She correctly concluded that it was an armadillo.
Her office was also where she kept her collection of curiosities. It included walking sticks collected from her travels, animal skins (many of which she skinned herself), stuffed animals including an alligator which had not completely expired when it was brought in to her office. Since she was so often alone, her son in law had once offered her a pistol to defend herself with, but she declined, saying she would rather use her fireplace poker. When the alligator revived itself in the middle of the night, she dispatched it with her fireplace poker and some gardening tools. The stuffed alligator can be seen behind her chair in the image below.
In wet weather, Dr. Sofie got around on horseback. The story is shared in a Freeport newspaper article that she made a special request of a local seamstress to make her split skirts so that she could comfortably ride to calls. In dry weather she rode in a buggy pulled by two horses. An oddity was that she became known for her skill in extracting bullets from patients. She saved all the bullets that she removed and at one point, she took twenty-four of them to a jeweler and had a necklace made with her bullet trophies. It was said that she wore it around her neck all the time. Around 1907, Dr. Sofie, as she had become known, was hired as a surgeon with the Saint Louis, Brownsville and Mexico Railway.
The Saint Louis, Brownsville and Mexico Railway was chartered in 1903 by a board of directors that included Robert J. Kleberg, Jr.. It was initially organized to be a short line running from Sinton, Texas to Brownsville and later expanded its reach to allow service all the way to Mexico City. About twenty years later it was acquired by the Missouri Pacific Lines (“MoPac”). Eventually, it lost its separate identity when it was merged into the larger company.
While working for the railroad, employees would bring accident victims to her or she would go to the accident scene, traveling by any means available. There was no lack of work. Her surgery services sometimes included amputations, setting broken bones and extracting more bullets. Dr. Sofie worked with the railroad company for a total of eighteen years until she was unable to continue due to her health. While working for the railroad, she kept up her private practice in Brazoria and maintained records of all the babies she had delivered. One article gives the number of deliveries at over 1,700. Her working years were long before the days of free standing pharmacies, and as noted above, her medical office became the local source for pharmaceuticals.
She remained single for many years until 1913 when she married James Marion Huntington, a successful local farmer whose first wife, Anne Contessa Roane Huntington had passed away the previous year. She moved to the plantation/farm about seven miles from Brazoria. About the same time as when she married Mr. Huntington, she bought a Ford automobile and had the auto salesman teach her to drive it.
The doctor was active in the community. investing in a local hotel when the need arose. Sophie left the Catholic faith over a disagreement with the local priest and joined the Episcopal Church. She later financed the construction of Brazoria’s first church building for the congregation.
Dr. Sofie was a remarkable woman. For many of her patients, she was probably the first female doctor that they had ever met. She was said to be the first female railroad doctor and the first female member of the South Texas Medical Society. She was elected vice president of this medical group and was known for attending each semiannual meeting of the medical society while she was able.
Dr. Sofie died in the summer of 1925 at the age of seventy-nine from complications following a stroke. Her husband James Huntington survived her another three years. She is buried in the Old Brazoria Cemetery. Before she died, she directed that her necklace of bullets be placed in her casket and it was done as she asked.
A Texas historical marker was unveiled in 2017 in Brazoria honoring Dr. Sofie. It is located near the site of her office. The Brazoria Heritage Foundation Museum maintains a replica of her clinic. The museum also has her old buggy that she used in the early days of her medical practice.
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