Baiertal Jewish Community

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The establishment of the Jewish community in Baiertal , a district of the city of Wiesloch in the Rhein-Neckar-Kreis ( Baden-Württemberg ), goes back to the 18th century. The Jewish community existed until 1937.

history

The first Jews came to Baiertal shortly after 1700 as subjects of the Teutonic Order , but had to pay protection money to the entire condominium owners. The Jews had their first prayer room in the Unterdorf, between 1800 and 1805 the community built a synagogue in the center of the village , next to which a Jewish school was built in 1839 . The ritual bath ( mikveh ) was probably located in the school building. The dead of the community were buried in the Jewish cemetery in Wiesloch . In 1827 the community was assigned to the Heidelberg district rabbinate.

On the night of July 11th to 12th, 1801, Johannes Bückler, known as Schinderhannes , and his gang attacked the head of the Jewish community and wealthy trader Seligman Feist in his house in Baiertal. Feist and his wife and maid were mistreated and numerous valuables were stolen. Part of the gang was caught on the run, but Bückler himself was able to escape.

The Jewish community had temporarily employed a teacher who was both a prayer leader and a shochet . The school was upgraded from class II to class 1 in 1858, but the schoolhouse in the shade north of the synagogue was dark and damp, so that in 1864 classes were moved to a classroom set up in the synagogue. The Jewish school operation ended on August 31, 1868. From September 1, 1868 on, Jewish children had to attend regular Christian schools ( simultaneous schools ) again.

From the second half of the 19th century, the number of Jewish community members fell sharply due to rural exodus and emigration.

National Socialist Persecution

Due to the consequences of the economic boycott and reprisals, several Jewish citizens have moved away or emigrated. The Jewish companies had to be gradually closed.

During the November pogrom in 1938 , SA men attacked and demolished Jewish homes. The synagogue was set on fire and demolished soon after. Stones from the synagogue were used to drain the local sports field. The last 14 Jewish residents were deported to the Gurs camp on October 22, 1940 as part of the so-called Wagner-Bürckel campaign .

The memorial book of the Federal Archives lists 30 Jewish citizens born in Baiertal who fell victim to the genocide of the National Socialist regime .

Jewish residents in Baiertal

year number
1723 4 families
1803 31 families
1812 156 people approx. 18% of the population
1825 149 people approx. 15% of the population
around 1850 approx. 170 people
1875 118 people
1890 104 people
1900/02 84 people
1925 31 people
1933 25 people
1940 14 people

Commemoration

A column of the synagogue portal that has been preserved has been commemorating the Jewish community with a plaque on the former synagogue square since 1977 .

Personalities

  • Friedrich Brandeis (1835–1920), was born in Baiertal to Jewish parents, converted to Christianity in 1854 and later worked in the Jewish mission and for the Zurich Blue Cross .
  • Pauline Maier (1877–1942), a Jewish nurse born in Baiertal who was murdered during the Nazi era . Her father Raphael Maier had a horse shop at Hauptstrasse 8.

literature

  • District Association Baiertal (Ed.): From buridal to Baiertal , Wiesloch 1988, pp. 202–204, 207.
  • Klaus-Dieter Alicke: Lexicon of the Jewish communities in the German-speaking area. Volume 1: Aach - Groß-Bieberau. Gütersloher Verlagshaus, Gütersloh 2008, ISBN 978-3-579-08077-2 ( online edition ).
  • Joachim Hahn and Jürgen Krüger: Synagogues in Baden-Württemberg . Volume 2: Joachim Hahn: Places and Facilities . Theiss, Stuttgart 2007, pp. 518–520, ISBN 978-3-8062-1843-5 ( Memorial book of the synagogues in Germany . Volume 4)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Manfred Franke : Schinderhannes , Berlin 1977, quoted from Von buridal bis Baiertal 1988, p. 225.
  2. ↑ Commemorative Book - Victims of Persecution of the Jews under the National Socialist Tyranny in Germany 1933–1945 . Retrieved November 1, 2012.