. Offenburg is also the German name of Baia de Arieş in Romania.. 48 ° 29 'N, 07 ° 56' E, in Ortenaukreis, Freiburg, Baden-Württemberg W, near the French border. Jewish population: 387 (in 1880), 271 (in 1933). Offenburg ("open castle" - coat of arms) is a city with about 60,000 inhabitants as well as the largest city and administrative capital of the Ortenaukreis. Offenburg is approximately 15 km E of the Rhine between Karlsruhe and Freiburg. The French city of Strasbourg lies directly W across the Rhine. Offenburg lies at the mouth of the Kinzig river valley. The Kinzig flows out of the Black Forest and meets the Rhine near Kehl.Wikipedia. [Mar 2013]
OLD AND NEW JEWISH CEMETERIES with history and photos: A medieval Jewish community was destroyed in 1349 In the Bäckergasse with a 1393 synagogue . The 1300 ritual bath (mikvah) is beneath the 1793 house built at Glaser Straße 8. The modern Jewish community existed since the 17th century. During the Thirty Years' War in 1627, Jews were included in the city. The 1689 destruction of Offenburg, following the Nine Years War, led to the dissolution of the Jewish community. Beginning in 1862 Jews could settle again and in 1865 officially it was a municipality. Jewish emigration by rural villages to the cities, for example, from Diersburg , Friesenheim ,Rust and Schmieheim , increased the number of community members in 1868 to 150. The Jewish community was part of Offenburg Bezirksrabbinat Schmieheim, which was relocated in 1893 to Offenburg. The 1924 Jewish community Offenburg included Jewish people from the following locations: Appenweier (5), Durbach (8), Gengenbach (40), Haslach (10), Nordrach (7), Renchen (3) and Triberg (8) .
- Encyclopedia of Jewish Life (2001), p. 930-931: "Offenburg".
- HaKehilot Pinkas , Germany, Vol. 2 (1986), p. 224: "Offenburg"
- JewishGen GerSIG
The Jewish Cemetery: By the 17th century a (no longer existing) Jewish cemetery of the former Jewish community of Offenburg on today's Freiburgerplatz ("on Hohenrain the former Gutleuthaus"), a new one was created for Offenburg, Diersburg and Durbach. A "Jew bridge" for visiting foreign Jews, which is listed on older maps, led across a highland stream, on the road to the cemetery. The last Durbacher Jewish burial took place in 1813. By 1835 Durbacher Jewish community had their own cemetery. Two sunken gravestones were visible. At the end of 1836 the cemetery land was auctioned. The cemetery was abandoned. Even in later years, road construction and demolition in the 1920s of the unprotected site made several gravestones of this cemetery come to light to be placed in the new Jewish cemetery of October 1868 when the city assigned a placeto a new Jewish cemetery (since 2010: called the old Jewish cemetery ).The Diers Burger Synagogenrat caused the new cemetery by excluding those Jews living in Offenburg from the burial association. The timing was propitious, because a new municipal cemetery at Moltkestraße was planned. The Offenburg council approved the transfer of 117 rods on the Jewish community on 13 December 1869 because the Jews agreed to bear the cost of the fence. This cemetery was enlarged in the general cemetery in 1912 and 1925. Since 1945, despite closure of the General Municipal cemetery, the last burial was in 1974. At the cemetery is a memorial to 45 "victims of tyranny 1933-45" (forced laborers, including many Jews, 41 predominantly Jewish concentration camp prisoners brutally murdered in April 1945 in the Ihlenfeld Barracks in Offenburg). Various signs and commemorative plaques are =(area of the cemetery: 26.67 ar) include the 23 October 1990 Holocaust memorial. In November 2010, a new Jewish cemetery in the southern part of the Weingarten cemetery was inaugurated in Offenburg. The land was purchased by the Jewish community Emmendingen with space for 80 graves . The inauguration of the cemetery was on 21 November 2010 in the presence of Chief Rabbi Benjamin Soussan. Cemetery restoration.
77652 Baden-Württemberg (Gerz, Peters).
LOCATION OF CEMETERY:
1. OLD cemetery in today’s am Hohen Rain area (Detail).
IN USE: From around the 17th century until 1813.
NUMBER OF GRAVESTONES: None. There is no traceleft of the old cemetery.
DOCUMENTATION:
- 1982 photographs of gravestones with mapping of graves by Zentralarchiv.
- 1995 cemetery documentation including above photographs by the Office fo Historic Monuments (Landesdenkmalamt ed. Michael Thon).
- Numerous photographs of individual gravestones and general cemetery views in Alemannia Judaica.
- History by Kähni 1969, pages 88, 93.
- History by Dengler 1973.
- History in Offenburg 1983.
- The Jewish community was obliged to pay ground rent up to 1835. At that time there still remaiend 2 gravestones, which had sunk into the ground. The city authorities wanted to use this area as common land. The Jewish community insisted that the soil should not be turned over and that the area should be kept as grassed land. The protracted negotiations led nowhere and eventually the cemetery was sold by auction in 1836 (Kähni 1969, page 93).
- Until the Jewish communities of Diersburg and Durbach acquired their own cemeteries they used this cemetery for burials.
- There are 9 gravestones in the new cemetery, presumably originating from this old cemetery, which were. found during road construction in the 1920s.
LOCATION OF CEMETERY:
2. NEW cemetery Moltkestrasse, section of the old non-Jewish City cemetery (Detail).
IN USE: From 1870 until 1942 and still open. Oldest datable gravestone 1871.
NUMBER OF GRAVESTONES: 284 in 1987.
DOCUMENTATION:
- 1987 photographs of all gravestones with mapping of graves by Zentralarchiv.
- 1995 cemetery documentation including above photographs by the Office for Historic Monuments (Landesdenkmalamt ed. Barbara Döpp und Monika Preuss).
- 1980 documentation of the 9 gravestones from the old cemetery now in the new one by Bamberger.
- 1988 copies of all gravestone inscriptions and translations by Samy Dzialoszynski.
- Numerous photographs of individual gravestones and general cemetery views in Alemannia Judaica.
- History by Kähni 1969, page 93.
- Photographic survey by Hundsnurscher/Taddey 1968, fig.#. 168.
- Photographic survey by Theobald 1984, page 101.
- Histroy and translation of all gravestone inscriptions in Offenburg 2000.
- Samuel Dzialoszynski/Martin Ruch: Der Gute Ort. Der jüdische Friedhof in Offenburg pub.2000 (LBI and Deutsche National Bibliothek).
- Otto Kähni: Geschichte der Offenburger Judengemeinde. In: Die Ortenau 49 1969, particularly page15 (LBI).
- According to Dzialoszynski there are 7 but according to Bamberger there are 9 gravestones, which presumably came from the old cemetery (1771-1804). The were dug up during excavating work on what is today’s Freiburger Platz and brought to the new cemetery.
- The establishment of a new Jewish cemetery was agreed upon in principle by the City Council in December 1869, after the Jewish community had agreed to pay for a surrounding cemetery fence. The cemetery was extended twice, in 1912 and again in 1925. The cemetery continued to be used after 1945, in spite of the non-Jewish City section having been closed.
- There is a memorial and 45 graves for The victims of Tyranny 1933-45. Forced labourers including many Jews - of whom 41 were concentration camp prisoners - were brutally murdered in April 1945 in the Ihlenfeld barracks. Several information boards and memorial plaques are in place, including one dedicated on 23 October 1990, in memory of the Offenburg victims of the Holocaust.
[Researched and translated from German August 2008]
To see information and photographs of individual gravestones in cemeteries in Baden-Wuerttemberg, click on this link and follow the directions on that page.