Jewish community north
The Jewish community in Norden existed for a period of around 450 years from its beginnings in the 16th century to its end in October 1940. The Jews on Norderney also belonged to the community in Norden , who ran their own synagogue from 1878, but their dead continued to be buried in the Jewish cemetery in Norden.
History of the Jewish community in the north
It is no longer possible to determine exactly when the first Jews settled in the north . A contemporary source mentions a local Jew for the first time in 1581. Based on later sources, however, it can be assumed that there must have already been a Jewish community in the village at this time. This emerges from a letter from the north resident court Jew Meyer Calmans to Princess Christine Charlotte . He wrote on August 22, 1669 that the Jews in Norden had leased a piece of land a hundred years ago to build a cemetery on it. This was the oldest Jewish cemetery in East Frisia . The Jews of Emden and Aurich first buried their dead here. When the lease was renewed in September 1669, this information was confirmed and it was pointed out that, according to instructions , the Jews had correctly paid and reimbursed their wages every year .
16th century to 1933
In 1577 the Jews from Norden and Emden wrote a letter to Countess Agnes von Hoya (Agnes von Hoya was married to Count Johann II von Rietberg and Lords of the Harlingerland and was the mother of Walburga, the heir to the County of Rietberg and later wife Enno III. ), Expressed their concerns about the threat of expulsion from East Frisia and asked them to stand up for the Jews of East Frisia with Count Edzard II . The reason for this letter was a dispute between the city of Emden and the Count in Aurich, who both claimed for themselves and alone the collection of protection money and escorting Jews. It is not known whether Agnes stood up for the Jews; in any case, the Count seems to have emerged victorious from this conflict, because the Jews were not expelled. The conflict was by no means resolved and the East Frisian cities continued their complaints against the Jews.
The (first) synagogue was built in 1804. In contrast to the other East Frisian towns, however, the Jewish community in the north was confronted with open anti-Semitism, which even increased with the increased influx of Polish and Russian Jews as a result of the pogroms from 1881 to 1884 : Recha became a suitor (* 29 October 1892 in Norden , East Friesland ; † April 2, 1984 in Jerusalem , Israel; born Schweitzer) was confronted with this anti-Semitism in her childhood when she and her family were prevented from entering Blücherplatz by a sign.
In addition, at the turn of the century there were rumors that the Jews who had moved in would transmit cholera. The Ostfriesischer Kurier wrote (among other things) that the more naughty than serious behavior against the meat shortage also harbors serious dangers with regard to the threatening cholera that rises its head. Because with the opening of the border not only Russian pigs, but also - Russian Polish Jews cross the borders! The official Kreisblatt from the north hits the same line and writes: Much more dangerous are the Russian-Polish Jews in their unbelievable uncleanliness.
This open anti-Semitism in the north may have contributed to the fact that Zionism spread from the north over East Frisia and the Netherlands. From 1897 there were Zionist lectures in the north. An article by Die Welt states:
“ North. Our East Frisian Jews, a physically and mentally healthy tribe, which emerged from a mixture of Spagnolian and Ashkenazi, had the first opportunity a few days ago to hear about Zionism and to be enthusiastic about it. Dr. Loewe from Jaffa, who has traveled to all parts of Palestine many times, gave a brilliant and interesting lecture on 'Palestine, country and people'. No member of the community failed to join the 'Esra' in whose name the propaganda lecture took place, sometimes with very notable contributions. Dr. Tomorrow Loewe will give lectures on national Jewish contributions in two other cities in East Frisia in order to then carry the Zionist propaganda to the Netherlands. The fear of evil Zionism, which certain rabbis deliberately carried into the people, is unknown here. At the same time, these successes should not be underestimated as they will be the basis of agitation directed towards West Friesland and Holland. We wish the caller continued success in the dispute. "
In 1903 the synagogue was rebuilt at the same location. Next to it, a school, a mikveh (ritual immersion bath), houses for the teacher, the cantor and the synagogue servant as well as the secretariat formed the Jewish community center in Synagogenweg (formerly called Judenlohne ).
1933 to 1938
After the National Socialists came to power in 1933, the Jews in the north, as everywhere in Germany, suffered from the repression of the Nazi state: First they were registered, the Gestapo also checked the political views of some of them. Associations, organizations and events were also under observation with the beginning of the National Socialist dictatorship . On March 28, 1933, all Jewish shops in Norden were closed. On the same day, Anton Bleeker, the standard leader for East Friesland, issued a ban on slaughter in all East Frisian slaughterhouses and ordered that the slaughter knife be burned. On March 29th, the population of the north was informed about the further implementation of the boycott with an advertisement from the SA in the Ostfriesischer Kurier , in which it said:
" Notice!
The action committee of the North District for the practical and planned implementation of the boycott of Jewish shops, Jewish goods, Jewish doctors and Jewish lawyers is located in Norden in the 'Börse', phone 2188
The SA leadership "
The names of the citizens who continued to shop in Jewish stores were published in the press. The boycott was officially ended on April 5, as the agitation has now completely ceased.
Nevertheless, the discrimination continued through propaganda, ordinances and laws. In 1934, for example, the Jewish school was declared a “private school”, which reduced state subsidies to a minimum.
In the north there were attacks by the SA against a young Jew and his "Aryan" girlfriend for so-called " desecration ": the audience applauded at these attacks. A little later, a young woman who was accused of having relationships with a Jew was picked up, she was taken publicly through the city and the sign that she had to wear around her neck read: “I am a German girl and I am dated Let the Jews desecrate ”.
"Reichspogromnacht" 1938
On the night of November 9-10, 1938, the riots against the Jews ordered by Goebbels and Hitler also took place in the north, which were later referred to as the “Reichskristallnacht” or November pogroms 1938 , but which took place on that night for those at the time Conditions initially had an unusual course:
The district leader of the NSDAP of Norden-Krummhörn, Lenhard Everwien , was not reached until midnight by the district chief Meyer, who happened to be in Emden. The latter informed him that the responsible SA leader in the north, Sturmbannführer Wiedekin, could not be reached. According to the procedure, Ewerwien should "now take this into their own hands". After Ewerwien initially remained inactive, he was then asked directly from Oldenburg at around 1 a.m. to wake Wiedekin. Everwien then called the party and SA leadership as well as the fire brigade together in the early morning hours of November 10th. He informed them of the order that the synagogue be set on fire and that all Jews be arrested. He demanded guarantees from the fire brigade that the neighboring houses would be protected. Wiedekin, who had been awakened in the meantime, passed the order on to the SA in Dornum, which was subordinate to him.
From now on, the process does not differ from other places: Shortly afterwards the synagogue burned, the fire brigade was called in to prevent the fire from spreading to "non-Jewish" property, but not to save the burning synagogue. The Jews were rounded up, humiliated and mistreated by the SA using a Jewish card index , and driven to the northern slaughterhouse. The next day they were first used to clean up the synagogue, whereby the SA forced them to burn cult objects that were still preserved. Then the women were released and the men were partly housed in the school and partly in the northern prison. On November 11th they were finally "transferred" to Oldenburg together with about 200 other Jewish East Frisians, where they were rounded up in a barracks. Approx. 1,000 Jewish East Frisians, Oldenburgers and Bremers were then deported by train to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp north of Berlin, where they remained imprisoned until December 1938 or early 1939.
Gradually released, they had to pay the costs of the ordered destruction of the synagogue themselves; the reconstruction of the synagogue itself was forbidden. All accounts of Jewish citizens were blocked and a “Jewish tax” of 500 to 3000 Reichsmarks was charged , they only received an exemption of 150 Reichsmarks per month.
Exodus, displacement and murder
After the November pogroms, the Jewish community in Norden quickly dissolved. In 1938, 78 Jews lived in the village and another 10 in Marienhafe, which belongs to the synagogue community, but by April 16, 1940, this number fell to 11 people. Nine of them were transported away shortly afterwards, while the two teenage sons of a Jewish father and a non-Jewish mother could be hidden with relatives outside of Germany from October 1940 and could no longer be found. Either way, the National Socialist authorities were able to report Norden to be “ free of Jews ”.
post war period
Almost 50% of the Jewish northerners were murdered in the Holocaust. In the north itself, the trials against those primarily responsible took place in 1948 and 1951. In both trials, the court sentenced 13 dismissals and seven acquittals to prison terms of between one and four years, most of which were suspended. A Jewish community no longer exists.
Community development
The Jewish community in Norden maintained a branch on Norderney from 1878 in order to do justice to the many Jewish bathers there. Other places whose Jewish citizens were looked after by the Northern synagogue community were Hage , Marienhafe and Westerende .
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Memorials
The memorial for the burned down synagogue on Synagogenweg and a memorial in the Jewish cemetery commemorate the Jewish community. The memorial on the site of the former synagogue was created in 1987 on the initiative of the Ecumenical Working Group on Synagogenweg . A central component of the small square is a fragment of the foundation wall of the old synagogue that was exposed in September 1985. The fragment of the wall located below street level is accessed via a multi-step, terraced staircase. A sign above the wall fragment explains its meaning. The synagogue square is rounded off by a memorial stone as a reminder and a warning. The facility was inaugurated on the occasion of the meeting week in 1987 in the presence of former Northern Jews and their relatives. The path previously known as Judenlohne was renamed Synagogenweg through the city . Other buildings of the old Jewish community center in the immediate vicinity of the former synagogue have been completely preserved.
See also
literature
- Lina Gödeken: Around the synagogue in the north. The history of the synagogue community since 1866. Aurich 2000, ISBN 3-932206-18-5 .
- Herbert Reyer, Martin Tielke (ed.): Frisia Judaica. Contributions to the history of the Jews in East Frisia . Aurich 1988, ISBN 3-925365-40-0 .
- The end of the Jews in East Frisia. Catalog for the exhibition of the East Frisian landscape on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Kristallnacht. Verlag Ostfriesische Landschaft, Aurich 1988, ISBN 3-925365-41-9 .
- Hans Forster jun., Günther Schwickert: North. A district town under the swastika. Documents from the period of tyranny 1933–1945. Norden 1988 (published by the Norder Young Socialists and by the SPD local association Norden; self-printed)
- Daniel Fraenkel: North / Norderney. In: Herbert Obenaus (Ed. In collaboration with David Bankier and Daniel Fraenkel): Historical manual of the Jewish communities in Lower Saxony and Bremen . Wallstein, Göttingen 2005, ISBN 3-89244-753-5 , pp. 1122-1139.
- Ecumenical working group Synagogenweg Norden (ed.), Bernd Bohnsack, Walter Demandt, Almut Holler: remember, commemorate, hope under the star of david. Meeting week from June 19 to 24, 2005 in the north. North 2006.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b quoted from: Im deutscher Reich , issue October 10, 1905, p. 545.
- ↑ The world. Volume 1, issue 28 of December 10, 1897.
- ↑ East Frisian Courier. March 29, 1933.
- ^ Rheiderland newspaper. April 4, 1933, the victims were portrayed as perpetrators - here too.
- ^ The end of the Jews in East Frisia catalog for the exhibition of the East Frisian landscape on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Kristallnacht. Verlag Ostfriesische Landschaft, Aurich 1988, ISBN 3-925365-41-9 .
- ↑ The end of the Jews in East Frisia. 1988, p. 30.
- ^ Ostfriesische Landschaft: Fundchronik 1985 , accessed on January 1, 2010.
- ↑ A Week of Encounters , accessed January 1, 2010.
Coordinates: 53 ° 35 ' N , 7 ° 11' E
Jewish community Aurich | Bunde Jewish Community | Jewish community of Dornum | Jewish community Emden | Jewish community in Esens | Jemgum Jewish Community | Jewish community Leer | Jewish community Neustadtgödens | Jewish community north | Jewish community Norderney | Weener Jewish Community | Wittmund Jewish community