Solingen

First Jewish presence: early 18th century; peak Jewish population: 328 in 1905; Jewish population in 1933: 219

Jews settled in Solingen in the early 18th century, around which time, as records indicate, they established a prayer room and a cemetery. The Jews of Solingen grew in number during the 19th century; and in 1853, together with the smaller Jewish congregations in the area, they founded an official synagogue community. According to records, the Jewish cemetery on Estherweg was consecrated in the 1720s (and enlarged in 1900). In 1787, local Jews purchased a house at 25 Suedwall (present- day Ufergarten) and converted it into a synagogue and mikveh. Later, in 1858, the growing community decided to establish a larger synagogue. A suitable site was found on Malteserstrasse in 1861, but financial difficulties delayed construction, so that the new synagogue—it seated 150 men and 80 women—was not inaugurated until March 8, 1872; the site also accommodated a mikveh, a school building and an apartment for a teacher. Local Jews were involved in the textile, leather and fur businesses; others were butchers. Four factories that manufactured steel blades were Jewish-owned, two of which were considered large. In Solingen, Jewish organizations helped with burials and looked after the indigent, the sick and the elderly. In response to the anti-Jewish boycott of 1933, many Solingen Jews immigrated to Palestine. On November 9, 1938, SA men vandalized the synagogue and set it on fire, after which (the following day), the dome was blown up; the site was cleared in January 1939, an expense for which the Jewish congregation was billed. Private residences, Jewish- owned shops and the cemetery were vandalized on Pogrom Night, and 32 Jewish men were arrested. In 1941/42, the remaining Jews—most Jews had left Solingen by 1939—were deported to Lodz, Dachau and to Theresienstadt. At least 40 Solingen Jews perished in the Shoah. Few Jews returned to the town after the war; approximately ten lived there in the late 1960s. At the synagogue site, where a shelter was built in 1943/44, a plaque commemorates the former house of worship (the plaque was unveiled in 1979). The cemetery contains a memorial, and another plaque was unveiled on Malteserstrasse in 1998.

Swetlana Frank

Copyright: Pogrom Night 1938 - A Memorial to the Destroyed Synagogues of Germany/ Germansynagogues.com

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