Jewish community Neukirchen (Knüll)

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The Jewish community in the small town of Neukirchen in the north Hessian Schwalm-Eder district developed from its first beginnings in the 17th century and existed until the time of National Socialism .

Community development

Although three Jews are mentioned in Neukirchen as early as 1638 , no continuous settlement can be derived from this. In 1646 a Jewish family is mentioned in Neukirchen and in 1664 there were two. Eighty years later, in 1744, there were four so-called protection Jews with their families, which may have reached the number of men necessary for the formation of a Jewish religious community ( Kehillah ). In 1777 there were already 28 Jewish residents. In 1816/17 there were ten families with 36 children, in 1840 27 households with more than 80 members.

The number of Jewish residents of Neukirchen reached its highest level towards the end of the 19th century, but with 113 people in 1885 it made up only 7.3% of the total population. Most of them earned their livelihood as businessmen and merchants, sometimes as peddlers , but also as craftsmen and cattle dealers, and they were largely integrated into local life, such as their membership in the sports, gymnastics, singing, hiking and warrior clubs and in the Red Cross attested. It is noteworthy that 23 Jewish residents of Neukirchen served in the German army in the First World War ; the names of the five fallen are on the war memorial in the Marienkirche cemetery chapel in the municipal cemetery. When a Jewish war veteran died in 1927 of the long-term effects of his war injury, the bells of the Nikolaikirche rang at his funeral .

The number of Jewish residents remained relatively constant until well into the 1920s, before gradual emigration to larger cities and, to a lesser extent, abroad began under the impact of the economic crisis and increasing anti-Semitism. After the so-called seizure of power by the NSDAP in January 1933, the reprisals , professional bans , boycotts and ever-increasing disenfranchisement led within a few years to a drastic downsizing of the community by moving to larger German cities, especially Frankfurt ; only a minority managed to emigrate . From 1935 to the time of the November pogroms in 1938 , 33 Neukirchen Jews left the city for destinations within Germany, three went to Palestine , two to other European countries, four to the USA and one to another non-European country. Thereafter, by the end of 1939, eleven went to other German cities (10 to Frankfurt alone), four to Palestine, six to other European countries and two to the USA. In 1940 only one moved to Frankfurt and four to South America.

On 30 May 1942, the Jewish community heard Neukirchen to exist: on this day the seven living at this time in Jews to Poland deported and killed.

year Residents,
total 		Jewish
residents 		Share
in percent
1750 1313 28 2.1%
1812 ... 8 families ...
1827 1881 73 3.8%
1835 ... 78 ...%
1855 ... 94 ...%
1861 1820 94 5.1%
1871 1654 105 6.3%
1885 1540 113 7.3%
1905 1492 93 6.2%
1924 1626 108 6.6%
1933 1726 83 4.8%
1939 1714 18th 1.1%
1942 .... 9 ...%
1943 ... 0 0.0%

Facilities

The community facilities included a synagogue , the building of which housed the prayer room, the ritual bath ( mikvah ), the Jewish elementary school and the teacher's apartment, its own cemetery , the Israelite men's and women's club and, in the 20th century, the sports club “Makkabi ".

synagogue

In the beginning, the congregation had to be content with a prayer room in the home of a congregation member. After she had finally received the approval of the electoral government of the province of Upper Hesse , in February 1832 she acquired a two-story residential building (house no.141) in what was then Untergasse (today Brauhausgasse) and set up her synagogue, mikveh, school room and teacher's apartment there ( 50 ° 52 ′ 6 "  N , 9 ° 20 ′ 35"  E ).

During the November pogroms in 1938 , the synagogue was devastated by SA people and their fellow travelers on the evening of November 8th. It was only not set on fire because the local fire supervisor pointed out that a fire had spread to neighboring houses. The Torah scroll , the prayer books and the other remaining combustible cult objects were burned in the market square.

The building was later "bought" by the city of Neukirchen. From 1940 to 1945 it was used as accommodation for French prisoners of war who were used as slave labor in the village . From 1945 the building was used as a residential building. After the restitution proceedings were completed in 1951, it was renovated and rebuilt and still serves as a residential building today.

A memorial stone has stood opposite the building since 2012, commemorating the former synagogue and the Jews expelled and deported from Neukirchen.

school

The one-class Israelite elementary school existed at least since 1835 and was located in the synagogue building. The teacher employed by the congregation, whose small apartment was also there, was at the same time a prayer leader and a schochet (butcher) and also had to hold the services because the congregation could not afford its own rabbi . In 1868 there were 21 students, in 1880 their number had increased to 29. After that, their number steadily decreased: in 1908 there were 11, in 1924 15, but only seven in 1931/32. The school was officially closed in May 1933.

In 1935 the community planned to set up a district school in Neukirchen for the Jewish children from Neukirchen, Oberaula and Ziegenhain , but that never happened.

societies

The two most important Jewish associations were the Israelite Men's Association founded in 1875 and the Israelite Women's Association founded in 1910. Both were charities, which were primarily dedicated to nursing the sick and observing ritual customs (especially at funerals).

graveyard

Until the middle of the 19th century, the deceased of the community had to be buried in the Jewish cemeteries in Oberaula or Nieder Grenzebach. It was not until 1844 that the synagogue community received permission to set up its own Jewish cemetery , but it seems to have been some time before a suitable piece of land could be purchased and prepared. The oldest legible tombstone still in existence bears the date 1858. In 1930, a piece of land was bought to expand the cemetery. The cemetery is located on Schwarzenborner Straße a few hundred meters northeast of the old town ( 50 ° 52 ′ 18 ″  N , 9 ° 20 ′ 48 ″  E ), covers 5.34 acres and today still contains around 100 tombstones.

During the November pogrom in 1938 almost all gravestones were overturned by SA men.

The last gravestone is from 1940. In the same year the cemetery was officially closed, and a member of the community who died in 1941 had to be buried in the cemetery near Nieder Grenzebach.

The cemetery site was acquired by the city for 300 RM from the Reich Association of Jews in Germany in 1943 . The overturned tombstones were erected again after 1945, and in 1946-48 the cemetery was returned to the Jewish Restitution Successor Organization , which, however, had to repay 300 RM to the city.

In 1971 the city erected a memorial stone on the cemetery “in memory of the former Jewish religious community and in memory of the victims in the years 1933–1945”.

End of the parish

During the pogrom on November 8, 1938, not only the synagogue and the cemetery were desecrated and devastated, but the shops and apartments of Jewish citizens were broken into and looted, their facilities were destroyed and some people were severely mistreated. The Jewish men were arrested on November 10th, brought to the Buchenwald concentration camp via Kassel and only released after several weeks of “ protective custody ”. The end of the church was in sight. Anyone who could left Neukirchen and either went to Frankfurt, where help from co-religionists and foreign consulates was expected, or directly abroad. The last seven remaining still in place Jews on May 30, 1942 to Kassel and from there to Poland deported where they were then killed.

As far as is known so far, 57 Jewish people who came from Neukirchen or had lived there for a long time were killed during the Nazi era. The oldest of them was born in 1860, the youngest in 1931.

Post Comment

A memorial book compiled in 1976 on behalf of the city's magistrate and since then kept in the town hall contains the names of 52 known members of the former religious community of Neukirchen who fell victim to the Nazi tyranny.

Since March 2014 the city has been participating in the so-called “ Stumbling Stones ” project: List of Stumbling Stones in Neukirchen (Knüll) .

Footnotes

  1. ^ Greve: A good place, p. 163
  2. ^ Greve: A good place, p. 163
  3. ↑ In the Nazi era, the names were not knocked out, but at the direction of the mayor only with paper strips pasted (Adolf Biskamp, Friedhelm Walper The Jewish Community in Neukirchen. : In: Hartwig Bambey and others (eds). Contributions to the History; expellees neighbors of the Jews in the district of Ziegenhain. Volume 2, Edition Hexenturm, Schwalmstadt-Treysa, 1993, p. 474)
  4. ^ Greve: Eine kleine Stadt, p. 125
  5. ↑ Many cult objects had already been brought to the main synagogue in Kassel , where they fell victim to the synagogue's fire on November 7th.
  6. ^ Greve: A good place, p. 163
  7. ^ Greve: Eine kleine Stadt, p. 136
  8. ↑ On the history of the Jewish community in Neukirchen

Web links

literature

  • Paul Arnsberg : The Jewish communities in Hesse. Beginning - fall - new beginning. Volume 2. Societäts-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main, 1971, ISBN 3-7973-0213-4 , p. 123
  • Adolf Biskamp, ​​Friedhelm Walper: The Israelite religious community in Neukirchen. In: Hartwig Bambey u. a. (Ed.): Displaced Neighbors; Contributions to the history of the Jews in the district of Ziegenhain, Volume 2. Edition Hexenturm, Schwalmstadt-Treysa, 1993, ISBN 3-924296-07-3 , pp. 473-483
  • Barbara Greve: A small town in Hessen Neukirchen, the Jews and National Socialism. (National Socialism in North Hesse, Writings on Regional Contemporary History, published by the Department of Education / Human Sciences at the University of Kassel, Volume 23). Verlag Winfried Jenior, Kassel, 2010, ISBN 978-3-934377-20-2 ( Online , PDF)
  • Barbara Greve: A good place - the Jewish cemetery Oberaula. Research on a country cemetery in Northern Hesse. In: Journal of the Association for Hessian History and Regional Studies, Volume 117/118, 2012/13, pp. 161–196 ( Online , PDF)
  • Barbara Greve: Exile or death - flight and expulsion of the Jews from the rural communities of the old district of Ziegenhain. In: In: Bernd Lindenthal (Ed.): Heimatvertriebe Nachbarn, Volume 3. Edition Hexenturm, Schwalmstadt-Treysa, 2008, pp. 1-56
  • Barbara Greve: Everyone has a name. What was done to the Jews from Neukirchen am Knüll, 1933–1942. In: Bernd Lindenthal (Ed.): Heimatvertriebe Nachbarn, Volume 3. Edition Hexenturm, Schwalmstadt-Treysa, 2008, pp. 307–446
  • Schmuel Levi: Memories of my youth in Neukirchen. In: Hartwig Bambey u. a. (Ed.): Displaced Neighbors; Contributions to the history of the Jews in the district of Ziegenhain, Volume 2. Edition Hexenturm, Schwalmstadt-Treysa, 1993, ISBN 3-924296-07-3 , pp. 455–462