Jewish community of Wesel
For centuries, the Jewish community comprised the Jewish residents of the Lower Rhine city of Wesel . Under the National Socialists , the Jews of Wesel were expelled or murdered, so that in 1942/1943 no more Jews lived in the city. The last synagogue, built in 1841, was destroyed during the November pogroms in 1938 .
Early history of the Jewish community
Wesel belonged to the Duchy of Kleve and received city rights in 1241. The earliest evidence of the presence of Jews comes from the year 1266. Little is known about the development of the religious community in the Middle Ages, but during the plague pogroms of 1348/1349 violence against Jewish residents is said to have occurred in Wesel and led to their displacement . The Duchy of Kleve refused entry to Jews for a long period of time and this did not change until the late 16th century. Soon afterwards there was another brief expulsion, and from 1625 Jewish families were able to settle again in Wesel. When the Dutch recaptured the city from the Spanish in 1629 in the context of the Thirty Years' War , the Jewish residents were greatly affected by looting. The foundation of a permanent Jewish community can be dated to the 17th century. At the end of the 17th century there were two synagogues, one at the western end of the city near the Fischertor and one on Rheinstrasse in close proximity to the Willibrordi Cathedral . The latter was built in 1694 and donated by the Gomperz family .
Under Prussian rule, the economic situation of many Wesel Jews deteriorated because they had to pay increased taxes. However, the situation improved again during French rule (1806 to 1814) and in the period thereafter. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the community also included Jewish citizens of surrounding places, including Brünen , Hamminkeln , Schermbeck and Ringenberg , and later Lackhausen as well .
The last synagogue and the end of the congregation
The third synagogue was built around 1840. Their location was a bought private house again on Rheinstrasse. In the middle of the 19th century, a Jewish elementary school was added in the immediate vicinity. The school was on the forecourt of the cathedral and had access to the synagogue through its courtyard.
The number of members of the community varied in the low three-digit range, from 176 in 1816 to 240 people in 1885. In 1931 there were 214 Jews in Wesel, which was 0.9 percent of the total population. As a result of the persecution after the National Socialists came to power, there were only 46 Jews left in 1939 and in 1943 the community was officially considered to be wiped out. The exclusion of the Jews, who had previously been largely integrated into city life, began with the staged boycott of Jewish shops on April 1, 1933, which at that time was still not very successful. Erich Leyens gained notoriety through his resistance to the boycott. By 1936, however, nearly 20 businesses or businesses run by Jews had been closed. During the so-called Reichspogromnacht from November 9th to 10th, 1938, the synagogue on Rheinstrasse was burned down and the Jewish school, which had been closed for three years, was destroyed. Shops and apartments were also affected by the destruction. The local fire brigade helped with the burning down of the synagogue by being on standby in case the fire spread to surrounding buildings. The city's two Jewish cemeteries were not affected by the pogroms. On November 10th, several Jewish citizens were arrested and deported to Dachau. The last remaining Jews were deported in 1942, so that no more Jews lived in Wesel. At least 87 Jews from Wesel were verifiably killed by the Shoah .
Cemeteries and thoughts on site
The Jewish cemetery on the Esplanade and the Jewish cemetery on the Ostglacis have been preserved. In the immediate vicinity of the last synagogue there has been a memorial since 1988 and a plaque with the names of all persecuted and murdered Jewish families in the city has been located on the Wesel town hall since 2009. In 2009 the laying of stumbling blocks in Wesel began . In the Büderich district on the left bank of the Rhine , which was not yet part of the city at the time of National Socialism, there is also a memorial plaque for Jews persecuted there.
As a result of a series of commemorative events that were carried out in 1988 on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the pogrom night, contacts between Wesel residents and Jewish former citizens and their descendants who now lived elsewhere increased. In January 1994 this led to the establishment of the “Jüdisch-Christian Freundeskreis Wesel e. V. “Since then, events have been organized regularly, also in cooperation with local schools. In 2016 the Wesel city council decided to grant honorary citizenship to Ernest Kolman, a Jew who was born in Wesel in 1926 and fled to England in 1939 . He had visited Wesel many times before and was intensely committed to commemoration and against discrimination.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e f g Wesel / Niederrhein (North Rhine-Westphalia). In: From the history of the Jewish communities in the German-speaking area. Retrieved August 4, 2017 (private website).
- ↑ Westphaelisches Magazin on Geography, History and Statistics. 1787, p. 500.
- ↑ a b Entry on the synagogue in Rheinstraße Wesel in the database " KuLaDig " of the Rhineland Regional Association , accessed on August 4, 2017.
- ↑ Gerd Heiming: When the synagogue burned. In: rp-online.de. October 31, 2008, accessed August 4, 2017 .
- ↑ Petra Herzog: Persecuted, ridiculed, expelled. In: derwesten.de. November 7, 2008, archived from the original on July 11, 2016 ; accessed on August 4, 2017 .
- ↑ Reference date: November 9, 1938 - Pogrom Night. Hanseatic City of Wesel am Rhein, accessed on August 4, 2017 .
- ↑ The "Jüdisch-Christian Freundeskreis Wesel e. V. “ In: Time travel Wesel. Retrieved August 4, 2017 .
- ↑ Wesel: Ernest Kolman becomes an honorary citizen of Wesel. In: rp-online.de. April 12, 2016. Retrieved August 4, 2017 .