Wuppertal-Barmen
First Jewish presence: 1812; peak Jewish population: 721 in 1925; Jewish population in 1933: 720 (see below)
The earliest record of a Jewish presence in Barmen is dated 1812. In 1852, the Jewish community of Barmen merged with that of Elberfeld, only to separate from it and form the independent community of Barmen in 1894 or 1895. Local Jews attended synagogue services in Elberfeld until 1895/96, when a synagogue was built in Barmen at 18 Scheurenstrasse (present-day Zur Scheuren); Ludwig Levy, the renowned Jewish architect, designed the building. A rabbi served the community, and the town had a Jewish cemetery. Several Jewish organizations were active in Barmen, most notably the Israelitische Frauenverein (Jewish women’s association) and a number of sports clubs. Barmen became part of the city of Wuppertal in 1929. Seven hundred and twenty Jews lived in Barmen in 1933. By 1933, the Wuppertal-Barmen Jewish community had merged with Wuppertal-Elberfeld, with a combined Jewish population of approximately 3,000 (6% of the general population). In March of that year, the SA arrested a local Jew, after which he was severely beaten and thrown into the river (he drowned). Nearly all Jewish-owned stores were boycotted during the years that followed. At the end of October 1938, the town’s Eastern European Jews were expelled to the Polish border. On Pogrom Night, rioters incinerated the synagogue building; the fire department protected the adjacent buildings from the blaze. Several Jewish men were arrested that night and were sent to Dachau concentration camp. Confined to five designated “Jews’ houses” after the outbreak of World War II, local Jews were deported, together with the Jews of Elberfeld, in 1941 and the subsequent years. Of the 1,000 deported Jews (from both Barmen and Elberfeld) only 150 returned. A memorial plaque was later unveiled at the former synagogue site in Barmen. The city of Wuppertal is home to a small Jewish community.Benjamin Rosendahl
Copyright: Pogrom Night 1938 - A Memorial to the Destroyed Synagogues of Germany/ Germansynagogues.com
Notes
Sources: The Encyclopedia of Jewish Life Before and During the Holocaust, Shmuel Spector [Ed.], [publisher] Yad Vashem and the New York University Press, 2001., Lexikon der jüdischen Gemeinde in Deutschen Sprachraum, Klaus Dieter-Alicke, [publisher] Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 2008., Feuer in dein Heiligtum gelegt: Zerstörte Synagogen 1938 Nordrhein-Westfalen, Michael Brooke [Ed.], Meier Schwarz [foreword], [publisher] Kamp, 1999.
Details
| Date Added | Feb 18, 2020 |
|---|---|
| Category | Residential |
| Country | DE |
| State | North Rhine-Westphalia |
| City | Wuppertal-Barmen (Barmen) |
| Exhibits | Pogrom Night 1938 - A Memorial to the Destroyed Synagogues of Germany |
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