Mehlsack

Residential - Pieniężno (Mehlsack), Warmia-Masuria

First Jewish presence: 1832; peak Jewish population: 129 in 1871; Jewish population in 1933: five families

Mehlsack, originally in East Prussia, is now part of Poland (renamed Pieniezno). The Jewish community of Mehlsack, established in the early 1800s, maintained a synagogue on Wormditter Strasse and a Jewish cemetery in an area known as the Judenberg, or “Jews’ hill” (next to the location of the future train station). Local Jews started to emigrate from Germany after the Nazis’ election victories, so that in 1933 only five Jewish families lived there. By 1939, all Jews had left the city, and Mehlsack was declared Judenfrei (free of Jews). The synagogue, however, was nevertheless burned down, together with all its contents, on Pogrom Night.

Moshe Finkel

Copyright: Pogrom Night 1938 - A Memorial to the Destroyed Synagogues of Germany/ germansynagogues.bh.org.il

Notes

Sources: Führer durch die Jüdische Gemeindeverwaltung und Wohlfahrtspflege in Deutschland 1923-1933, Andreas Nachama, Simon Hermann [Eds.], [publisher] Edition Hentrich, 1995., Lexikon der jüdischen Gemeinde in Deutschen Sprachraum, Klaus Dieter-Alicke, [publisher] Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 2008.

Details

Date Added	May 20, 2020
Category	Residential
Country	PL
State	Warmia-Masuria
City	Pieniężno (Mehlsack)
Exhibits	Pogrom Night 1938 - A Memorial to the Destroyed Synagogues of Germany

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Mehlsack

First Jewish presence: 1832; peak Jewish population: 129 in 1871; Jewish population in 1933: five families

Moshe Finkel

Copyright: Pogrom Night 1938 - A Memorial to the Destroyed Synagogues of Germany/ germansynagogues.bh.org.il

Notes

Details

Have additional information, photos, connections, or other resources to contribute?

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Jason Guberman-P., A social entrepreneur who specializes in building broad coalitions and melding intellectual and technical innovation, serves as founding Executive Director of Digital Heritage Mapping and is the coordinator of the Diarna Geo-Museum of North African and Middle Eastern Jewish Life.

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Joshua Shamsi, is Project Director for the Atlas of Jewish Life and Lead Photographer/Outreach Director for the Diarna Geo-Museum of North African and Middle Eastern Jewish Life.

Eddie Ashkenazie

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Eddie Ashkenazie, is a Yeshiva University PhD student focusing his studies on the Jews of the Middle East and North Africa in the modern era.

Avital Hirsch

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Glenn Dynner

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Glenn Dynner. Professor of Religion, Sarah Lawrence College. BA, Brandeis University. MA, McGill University. PhD, Brandeis University. Scholar of East European Jewry with a focus on the social history of Hasidism and the Haskalah.

Chrystie Sherman

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