Otto HERSCHMANN

Otto Herschmann competed in two different sports at the Olympics. His first Olympic appearance was in swimming, losing the 1896 100 m freestyle competition narrowly to Hungary's Alfréd Hajós. He returned to Athens a decade later, this time as a fencer. He again placed second in Stockholm 1912, winning a silver medal with the Austrian sabre team. That same year, he became president of the Austrian Olympic Committee, a position he held until the end of World War I. For almost two decades (1914-1932), he served as the president of the Austrian Swimming Federation.

A Jew, he was set to be deported to the Yugoslav concentration camp Izbica. However, his transport was re-routed to the extermination camp Sobibór in Poland on 14 June 1942. Sometimes this date is listed as his date of death, but he most likely died in a gas chamber three days later.