New Synagogue (Wunstorf)

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New Synagogue Wunstorf - Küsterstrasse 9
Apse / east side

The new synagogue of the city of Wunstorf was on Küsterstraße. It was devastated during the November pogrom in 1938. The building still exists today as a residential building.

history

Wunstorf is one of the few small towns in which people of the Jewish faith lived as early as the 13th century. Wealthy Jews paid a certain sum to the respective sovereign in order to acquire a letter of protection that gave them permission to settle and that protected them from arbitrariness. The so-called protective Jews were, however, disadvantaged in every respect compared to the citizens of the city by the legislation. With the law of September 30, 1842 and the subsequent laws, the aim was to equate Jews with the rest of the population in the Kingdom of Hanover and thus in Wunstorf. On May 29, 1843, Jews from Wunstorf were granted citizenship for the first time. In paragraph 35 of this law it was determined that from now on every Jew in the kingdom had to belong to a synagogue congregation ( parochial compulsion ). The districts of the synagogue parishes were determined by the government. "For the construction, relocation and abolition of a synagogue, the approval of the government is necessary, for the establishment and inauguration that of the state rabbi."

Synagogue community

tasks

The tasks of the synagogue community can be described in three terms: cult , finance and school. The institutions without which no Jewish community can do its job are the synagogue , the cemetery and the ritual immersion bath . The most important institution of the community is the synagogue and the worship service. Furthermore, the community has to ensure that its members live the common religious conviction and can comply with the religious laws. This includes the establishment of the Schechita and kosher meat sales.

Synagogues in Wunstorf

Since 1810 there was a synagogue in the form of a small prayer house at Nordstrasse 14. The growing community took advantage of this until it decided in 1912 to sell the house, which had become dilapidated and probably too small, and which also housed the school and the teacher's apartment. In the same year, a five-year-old house at Küsterstrasse 9 was acquired and converted so that the ground floor could be used as a synagogue and school from 1913. The school consists of a classroom and a staff room. The teacher's apartment was on the first floor, the caretaker's apartment on the second.

Heiner Wittrock reports in his publication on "The fate of the Jews in Wunstorf" based on contemporary witness reports:

Every visitor to the synagogue had to submit to the synagogue regulations established in 1832. Through the law of 1842 on the legal relations of the Jews, the authorities had determined that 'at least one lecture was to be given in German' during the service. David Goldschmidt lived with his family right next to the new synagogue at Küsterstrasse 5. The slaughter of lambs and other animals took place on his farm, and Goldschmidt also traded their skins. From 1913 onwards, the Goldschmidt family met every Friday evening at sunset in front of the synagogue. The provisions of the Sabbath were strictly observed. (…) Every year in October the tabernacle was built in the garden behind the synagogue and the festival of tabernacles was celebrated in it.

Fate of the Jews

In the 1920s, the Wunstorf Jews reached the peak of their social position and integration through numerous prominent representatives in business, science and in social and club life. Nevertheless, they were exposed to hostilities that were still unstable and shaken by the global economic crisis.

After the transfer of power to Hitler in 1933, measures to discriminate against Jews (boycott of shops) began in Wunstorf. The local NSDAP group organized agitation against Jews, promoted social discrimination and denunciation, even against individual dissenting party members. By creating a Jewish card index , the Gestapo prepared the later persecution and deportation of the Jews living in Wunstorf in 1935. From 1936 onwards, some were able to save themselves from increasing marginalization, disenfranchisement and persecution by emigrating.

Reichspogromnacht in Wunstorf

List of "seized items"

On the night of the pogrom, 27 people of Jewish faith lived in Wunstorf, in nine households. On the evening of November 9, 1938, the starting signal for a nationwide pogrom was given in Munich. At 11:55 p.m. the Stapo control center in Hanover received a telex from Berlin. In Wunstorf, the instructions on actions against Jewish institutions and wealthy Jews began to be implemented on the morning of November 10 between three and four o'clock. Heiner Wittrock summarizes reports from eyewitnesses of the events:

Information board on the north wall of the house

With paintbrush and paint SA set out to mark the Jewish shops with a cross. Meanwhile, Bordenauer SA men penetrated the synagogue from the rear by breaking open the door there. A fire was immediately set in the eastern part of the synagogue. However, when the SA men from outside found out shortly afterwards that the local SA was arriving that the Christian caretaker family Heussmann lived on the upper floor of the synagogue, the fire was put out just in time. After that, the SA lived up to its reputation as a group of thugs in every respect: They demolished the interior of the synagogue by hanging on the chandeliers and tearing them down. Furthermore, the Torah shrine and all its inventory were smashed. Finally she built a spot trabbi from the stove, stove pipe and a suitable cloak. (...) The noise of the SA attracted the locomotive driver Bergmann, who was going to work. He thought it was original to be photographed with the shrine of the Jews, the Torah scroll. This was then brought to the town church to be cremated along with other books and writings.

The Jewish shops were also demolished by seven o'clock in the morning. Their owners were ill-treated when they were arrested. All Jewish residents of Wunstorf, with the exception of the few children, were locked in the town hall cellar. Meanwhile, SA men devastated the Jewish cemetery on Nordrehr . Most of the detainees were released at ten o'clock; those classified as “wealthy” on the Gestapo's list remained in “protective custody” and were transported to the police prison in Hanover, then to the Buchenwald concentration camp. Meanwhile, the SA plundered the 19 Jewish residents who remained in Wunstorf. From that day on, with the desecration of the synagogue, the synagogue community ceased to exist. In 1939 there were still 12 Jews living in Wunstorf. Until they were deported to various concentration camps on March 31, 1942, the former synagogue building served as a so-called "Jewish house". During the war years, the tax authorities take over its administration due to legal regulations.

Fate of the new synagogue

In 1945 the city of Wunstorf had to have the interior of the synagogue repaired by order of the governor of the British occupying forces . The costs for this amounted to 9,917.81 RM. For comparison, the approximate hourly wages at that time: apprentice (RM 0.50), journeyman (RM 1.30), master (RM 1.50). The work was all carried out by Wunstorf companies. "This makes the inventory considerably more valuable, since the furnishings are quite modest before the destruction." The synagogue room was used as a prayer room by the Jewish members of the British Army. The teachers' and classrooms were used by the military administration as storage rooms. The first floor was available to the military. On April 12, 1955, the building was sold to the Wunstorf master electrician Johann Wach by the Jewish Trust Corporation for Germany, which was appointed as a trust company for the collection of abandoned Jewish assets, community and organizational property. Since the mid-1980s, the building has belonged to two families who use it as a residential building.

See also

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Abraham Löb: The legal situation of the Jews in the former kingdom and the current province of Hanover, Frankfurt a. M. 1908, p. 103
  2. ↑ Klaus Fesche: History Wunstorf. The city, the town and the villages. to Klampen Verlag, Springe 2010, p. 153
  3. ↑ Heiner Wittrock: The fate of the Jews in Wunstorf, Ed. Stadt Wunstorf, Wunstorf 2007, p. 17
  4. ↑ Wittrock, 2007, p. 17f.
  5. ^ From the mayor of Wunstorf to the district administrator in Neustadt a. Rbge. List of Jews living in Wunstorf sent on December 14, 1935; City archive Wunstorf.
  6. ↑ Wittrock, p. 51
  7. ^ Jewish cemeteries in Wunstorf
  8. ↑ Fesche, p 217
  9. ↑ Wittrock, pp. 52-54
  10. ↑ A. Burkhardt, J. Hauger, U. Trompeter: Synagoge Wunstorf, Küsterstraße 9 , Braunschweig 1995, p. 14
  11. ↑ A. Burkhardt et al., P. 14
  12. ↑ A. Burkhardt et al., P. 14
  13. ^ Historical manual of the Jewish communities in Lower Saxony and Bremen, Vol. II, p. 1598
  14. ↑ Historical manual of the Jewish communities in Lower Saxony and Bremen

Coordinates: 52 ° 25 ′ 25.4 "  N , 9 ° 25 ′ 47.5"  E