Old Synagogue (Osnabrück)
The Old Synagogue was the synagogue of the Jewish community in Osnabrück (Lower Saxony) in the first half of the 20th century. The synagogue was set on fire on November 9, 1938, during the November pogrom . The demolition was ordered the same day.
history
Synagogues had existed in Osnabrück since the Middle Ages . One was on Schweinestrasse, which was later renamed Marienstraße, and another on Redlingerstrasse. Both are not preserved. On the property at Rolandstrasse 3–5 (now “Alte-Synagogen-Strasse”) the Cologne architect Sigmund Münchhausen built the multi-storey synagogue with a dome in the direct vicinity of the government building on behalf of the Jewish community of Osnabrück in the historicism style . The foundation stone for the synagogue was laid on September 12, 1905, and it was inaugurated on September 13, 1906. The synagogue separated men and women and was equipped with an organ. The Jewish school was also located on the property of the community in a separate four-story building that also contained apartments.
The immediate vicinity of the synagogue and school to the government building aroused the desire of the city and the district president in Osnabrück from 1937. The government building was built between 1893 and 1896 as the seat of the Royal Prussian government in the neo-renaissance style on the Chancellor's Wall (today Heger-Tor-Wall) and after the Second World War it served as the seat of the Osnabrück district government until the city was given the status of the seat of government in 1978 lost.
1937 to 1938
With the beginning of the National Socialism, the Jewish community found itself in increasing distress due to persecution of its relatives or their emigration. As early as 1937, efforts were made in Osnabrück to make more space available to the Secret State Police (Gestapo), which was based in the west wing of the Osnabrück Castle and had five detention and torture cells in the basement. A prison yard should be set up at the castle, and garages should also be built. The Mayor of Osnabrück, Erich Gaertner , also suggested that the area at the castle "[...] still built on with storage sheds should be incorporated into an open space to be created and maintained by the city [...]". At the same time, the government building should be expanded. For this purpose, the city wanted to buy the neighboring synagogue building, as stated in a note from the Ministry of Finance, from the “no longer efficient Jewish community at a price of around RM 74,000 ” and “to pay the state a compensation of RM 10,000 for the approx. To provide (to) provide a plot of 1600 m², which after the demolition of the synagogue building offers the only possibility of a sufficient extension of the government for all time. According to a note from the Ministry of Finance, a site inspection had already taken place on June 20, 1938.
Arson, demolition and foreclosure of the property
On the night of November 9th to 10th, 1938 ( Reichspogromnacht ), the synagogue was desecrated, looted and then set on fire by SA troops . The local fire brigade arrived, but was prevented by the SA from the extinguishing work and only protected the surrounding buildings from the flames spreading. 90 community members were initially detained on the same day in the cells of the Gestapo cellar and a few days later to Buchenwald concentration camp deported . The synagogue was damaged by the fire, but not completely destroyed. Mayor Erich Gaertner, however, found "building police reasons" to order the demolition of the building on the day of the arson.
The Stadtsparkasse Osnabrück , from which the municipality had taken out a mortgage of 18,254.11 Reichsmarks, applied for a payment order for 2,000 Reichsmarks on November 11, 1938 . The municipality could not raise the amount, whereupon the Stadtsparkasse applied for foreclosure on November 14, 1938 . The foreclosure auction of the synagogue and school building was scheduled for March 2, 1939. The value of the property was set by the court at 65,000 Reichsmarks.
The Stadtsparkasse was awarded the contract for 850 Reichsmarks. With a contract dated November 23, 1939, they handed over the property to the government for their extension; the city of the Sparkasse reimbursed the costs incurred. In return, the government of the city of Osnabrück signed over the desired areas at the castle.
Offices for the Hitler Youth and the War Graves Commission were set up in the school building . The living rooms and the roof were temporarily repaired. The extension of the government building was initially postponed.
After the end of the Second World War
After the end of the Second World War , the Israelite Community was re-established in October 1945, was temporarily given back the property “until the final transfer of ownership” and used the school building as a prayer and residential building. In November 1949, the municipality applied for an official refund, but failed because of plans by the government, which continued to expand their building and put forward urban planning reasons. In 1952 the property was transferred to the Jewish Trust Corporation , which came into conflict with the Israelite community over the use of the property. In 1954 the government bought the property from the Jewish Trust Corporation and added an annex to the existing government building on Alte Synagogen Strasse.
From 1967 to 1969 the Israelite Community built a new synagogue with a community center and apartments in the street “In der Barlage” in the Weststadt district . The Frankfurt architect Hermann Guttmann planned the synagogue in the Orthodox style with separation of women and men. The foundation stone was laid on December 11, 1967; The complex was inaugurated on June 1, 1969. In 2008/2010 the synagogue was expanded for 3.6 million euros after the congregation had grown to more than 1000 members after 1991 due to the influx of contingent refugees from the states of the former Soviet Union.
Felix Nussbaum and the synagogue
The painter Felix Nussbaum , born in Osnabrück in 1904 , who was murdered in the Auschwitz concentration camp in 1944 , portrayed himself in the synagogue in 1926 together with the prayer leader Elias Abraham Gittelsohn. The picture is entitled "The two Jews ('Inside the Synagogue in Osnabrück')" and depicts the synagogue in great detail. The painting is on loan to the collection of the Felix-Nussbaum-Haus in Osnabrück. The museum, built by Daniel Libeskind and completed in 1998, indicates the location of the former synagogue and the government building, which has been the headquarters of the Osnabrück Police Department since 2004 and which houses the Osnabrück department of the Lower Saxony state school authority.
Commemoration
Memorial plaque from 1978
Memorial plaque with Hebrew inscription
"Old Synagogue Memorial"
Memorial plaques on the memorial
Stumbling blocks in Neue Straße 20
A first memorial complex was erected at the former synagogue site in 1949/1950. In 1978 three memorial plaques were attached to the extension of the government building on the side facing Alten-Synagogen-Straße. They consist of a view of the synagogue as well as two inscription panels in German and Hebrew with the text: " To commemorate the senseless destruction on November 9, 1938 of the church of the Jewish community in Osnabrück, which was previously on this street ". At the same time, a section of Rolandstrasse was renamed "Alte-Synagogen-Strasse". The location of the plaques on the “perpetrators' building” has been increasingly criticized over the years.
In 2004, the “Old Synagogue Memorial” was built on the foundations of the former Jewish school, and more than 120 vocational school students and trainees took part in its construction.
Stolpersteine have been laid in Osnabrück since 2007, commemorating the victims of the National Socialist era . Those honored also included members of the Jewish community at the time, such as the one for the Jewish Silbermann family in front of their house on Neue Straße 20.
See also
literature
- Michael Gander: Interests in the Osnabrück synagogue property: Gestapo, Lord Mayor and District President In: Gestapo-Keller memorial in Osnabrück Castle , Gestapo-Keller memorial in Osnabrück Castle (ed.), Osnabrück 2003, pp. 25-29.
- Stefan Kröger: Das Osnabrück-Lexikon , H. Th. Wenner, Osnabrück 2004, 2nd expanded edition, ISBN 3-87898-395-6 , p. 180.
Web links
- The old and the new synagogue on the side of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Osnabrück
- Painting by Felix Nussbaum: "The two Jews ('Inneres der Synagoge in Osnabrück')", 1926 No. 14 in the Felix Nussbaum catalog raisonné
Individual evidence
- ↑ Michael Gander: Interests in the Osnabrück synagogue property: Gestapo, Lord Mayor and District President In: Gestapo basement memorial in Osnabrück Castle , Osnabrück 2003, p. 25
- ↑ Michael Gander: Interests in the Osnabrück synagogue property: Gestapo, Lord Mayor and District President In: Gestapo basement memorial in Osnabrück Castle , Osnabrück 2003, pp. 25-26
- ↑ Another city guide - persecutors and persecuted people at the time of National Socialism in Osnabrück, work group of the Graf-Stauffenberg-Gymnasium Osnabrück (ed.), 5th edition, Osnabrück 2001, pp. 9-11.
- ↑ How Osnabrück drove the Jewish community to ruin , noz.de, March 6, 2015, accessed on May 28, 2020.
- ↑ Page no longer available , search in web archives: Old Synagogue Memorial on the website of the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation Osnabrück
Coordinates: 52 ° 16 ′ 26.2 " N , 8 ° 2 ′ 21.2" E