Jewish community of Massenbach

Memorial stone for the three Massenbach Jews who died in the course of the deportations

The Jewish community in Massenbach in the Heilbronn district in northern Baden-Württemberg existed from the early 18th century. The religious community, which had its highest membership in 1843 with 85 people, was a subsidiary of Massenbachhausen from 1832 , before the seat of the community was moved to Massenbach in 1867. The decline of the community began as early as the second half of the 19th century due to emigration and emigration. Most of the 15 Jews still living in Massenbach in 1933 emigrated to the USA before 1938; the community was dissolved in May 1938. During the deportation of German Jews from 1940 onwards, three Jewish residents of Massenbach were killed.

history

Early church

Already a privilege of Emperor Charles V from 1556 allowed the local rulers , the barons of Massenbach , to settle Jews in Massenbach. Nothing is known about the size of a possible early Jewish community, but the field name Judenkirchhöfle could indicate a Jewish cemetery from the 16th century.

Modern church

The first written mention of Jews in Massenbach comes from the beginning of the 18th century. In 1729 there were three Jewish families, in 1748 seven families and in 1767 ten names. The living conditions of the Massenbach Jews in the 18th century are described as very modest. In 1790 the protection of five relatives was terminated because the place was overcrowded.

The wealthy Jewish Behr family acquired 187 acres of land from Baron Karl August von Massenbach in 1797 for over 50,000 guilders and at around the same time also donated a synagogue on the upper floor of a barn on their property. In 1808 twelve Jewish families lived in Massenbach, and in 1843 the community reached its highest membership level with 85 people. In the early 19th century there were only five houses in the village owned by Jews; most of the Jews lived for rent from the citizens of Massenbach. The Massenbach Jews themselves did not have citizenship ; this was only achieved with the Württemberg Equal Opportunities Act of 1864. Around this time, however, the Jewish community began to emigrate to surrounding cities and a wave of emigration , especially to America, so that the size of the rural community until 1900 to 36 people and later further decreased.

In 1832, the Jewish community in Massenbach and Bonfeld became a branch of the Jewish community in neighboring Massenbachhausen . However, since the community in Massenbachhausen was affected more quickly and more severely by emigration and emigration than the branch in Massenbach, the community seat was moved to Massenbach in 1867. In 1870 the community acquired a building in Massenbach for use as an Israelite denominational school , which was financed with the proceeds from the sale of the Massenbachhausen synagogue , which was sold in 1872 . In 1905 the lessons in Hebrew were moved to the Massenbach schoolhouse and the Jewish schoolhouse was then sold. The Massenbach synagogue was also used less and less over time, as the congregation often no longer had the ten men ( minyan ) over 13 years of age required to hold a Jewish service .

At the beginning of the 20th century, the Jewish community still numbered 18 people in 1910, the Massenbach Jews were active as grocers, butchers, blacksmiths and small cattle traders. In the 1920s, David Behr had a thriving textile business and the Wiener family temporarily had the local post office. The relationship between the small Jewish community and the rest of the population is described as extremely good. The children went to the same school. Fanny Wiener, a Jewish postmaster, married a local Protestant teacher in 1911. The Jewish men played an above-average role in the local community, so they joined the Massenbach volunteer fire brigade founded in 1929 , where David Behr was a train driver until his retirement in March 1933. He was also one of the founders of the gymnastics club and was awarded the Iron Cross, Second Class , in the First World War .

Current development on the site of the synagogue, which was demolished in 1951

Former residential and commercial building of the Jewish teacher and cantor Max Meyer

The first anti-Semitism in Massenbach occurred in 1924, when the Protestant pastor Karl Steger, who came to Massenbach in 1916 , ran for the national and social bloc in the Württemberg state elections and also gave anti-Semitic speeches in Massenbach. However, he received little support from the population and only 36 of 372 votes in the election. Opposition to Steger's views came in particular from the Heilbronn manufacturer Peter Bruckmann .

National Socialist Persecution

The relationship between the elderly and the Jewish fellow citizens remained good from 1933 onwards, despite the incipient anti-Jewish agitation by the National Socialists. However, the hate propaganda did not miss its target among local youth. In 1936, the local councilor Johann Wagner II demonstratively resigned from his position after the district leader had warned the Massenbach councilors not to buy their meat from the Jewish butcher.

In 1933 the Jewish community consisted of 15 people. Some of them emigrated to the USA shortly after the National Socialist " seizure of power ", some elderly people died in the early 1930s, and others emigrated in 1936 and 1937. In May 1938 the Jewish community was dissolved.

The synagogue, which was not destroyed during the Night of the Reichspogrom , was sold to private individuals in May 1939 by the late Jewish owners Louis (1871–1942) and Regine Abraham, who decided to emigrate. A right of residence until May 1940 was agreed in the purchase contract. However, the emigration was no longer approved and the last remaining Jews in Massenbach were forcibly quartered in a shared house in 1939, the 90-year-old Mina Wiener in the Jewish retirement home in Sontheim . During the deportation of German Jews , three Jews from Massenbach were killed: Siegmund Abraham was the last man in the Jewish community who was able to work to be deported to the east for labor service in 1941; his mother and another elderly woman were deported to the Theresienstadt concentration camp in August 1942 .

The memorial book of the Federal Archives lists 7 Jewish citizens born in Massenbach who fell victim to the genocide of the National Socialist regime .

synagogue

The synagogue was occupied by a Wehrmacht unit in 1940 and survived the Second World War. After the end of the war, the building came into the possession of the daughter of the last Jewish owner, who quickly sold it on. In 1954, the building was demolished due to its disrepair and a residential and workshop building with a gas station was built over it. The Jewish school, which had already been sold in 1905, was used for some time as an office of a bank and was demolished in 1951 due to its disrepair. Nothing today reminds of the former Jewish community in Massenbach. Those familiar with the area can still see the former residential and commercial building of the Jewish teacher and prayer leader Max Meyer (1879–1957) in an old building in the town center. A gas station and workshop building in the town center marks the site of the former synagogue. In front of the Massenbacher Georgskirche a memorial stone commemorates the three Massenbacher Jews murdered during the deportations.

Common names

When all Jews in Württemberg had to adopt hereditary family names in 1828, the heads of the Massenbach Jews took the following names: Abraham (3), Behr (3), Rosenfeld (3), Kahn (2), Armhold (1), Feiß (1) , Öttinger (1), Reichert (1) and Wiener (1).

literature

• Wolfram Angerbauer , Hans Georg Frank: Jewish communities in the district and city of Heilbronn. History, fates, documents . District of Heilbronn, Heilbronn 1986 ( series of publications of the district of Heilbronn . Volume 1)
• Paul Sauer : The Jewish communities in Württemberg and Hohenzollern. Monuments, history, fates . Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 1966 ( Publications of the Baden-Württemberg State Archives Administration . Volume 18)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Sauer (1966), p. 125.
2. ^ Commemorative Book - Victims of the Persecution of Jews under the National Socialist Tyranny in Germany 1933 - 1945 . Retrieved October 29, 2009.