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Coat of arms of Schwäbisch Hall Alternate names: Schwäbisch Hall [Ger], SCHWAEBISCH HALL), Hall. 49°06' N, 09°44' E, 23 miles E of Heilbronn, in NE Baden-Württemberg. Jewish population: 263 (in 1880), 115 (in 1933). Schwäbisch Hall (or Hall for short) is a town and capital of the district of Schwäbisch Hall. The town is located in the valley of the river Kocher in NE Baden-Württemberg. The first part of the name, "Schwäbisch", refers to the name of the region, Swabia (in English; "Schwaben" in German). The most probable origin of the second part of the name "Hall" is a west Germanic word family that means "drying something by heating it", likely referring to the salt production method of heating salty groundwater. The salt mine closed in 1925.   During Kristallnacht on 9 November 1938, local Nazis burned the synagogue located in Steinbach and devastated shops and houses of Jewish citizens. Approximately 40 Jewish citizens of Schwäbisch Hall fell victim to the Holocaust in extermination camps in Eastern Europe. In 1944 a concentration camp was established next to the train station Hall-Hessental. The train station at Hall was targeted by an American air raid on February 23, 1945, but the devastation was mostly limited to the suburbs of St. Katharina and Unterlimpurg. The town was occupied by US Army troops on April 17, 1945 without serious resistance. Although several buildings were destroyed or damaged, the historical old town suffered comparatively little. Wikiepdia. town website. synagogue and Jewish community history website. [Mar 2013]

  • Encyclopedia of Jewish Life (2001), p. 1152: "Schwaebisch Hall".
  • Pinkas HaKehilot, Germany, Vol. 2 (1986), p. 138: "Schw„bisch Hall"
  • JewishGen GerSIG
Jewish community was first mentioned 1241/42 when Jews paid 8 Haller silver marks to the king. This medieval Jewish community went through pogroms (plague) in 1349. In the late 14th and in the 15th centuries. Individual Jews lived in the city later on only an hourly or daily basis, probably for markets. In the 19th century they resettled in Schwäbisch Hall until 1939. The area in 1200 was to the south by the city walls, built in a limited way. On the East it reached from the street to Unterwöhrdstor on the west, to Haalplatz and north to Haalstraße. In this area was also the 1356 "Jewish school", as the synagogue. Later this was the slaughter house, remain in the basement wall of the medieval period are preserved. A document from 1356 to the synagogue in the back was offset at Haalstraße at the city wall. The yard was in a document from 1457, directed to Sulfertor. In another document, which dates from 1445 mentioned that the "Jewish house" lights could not be installed. According to a document from 1457, the property was sold to the Jewish school. Eventually, they had a prayer room, a Jewish school and a mikvah. A teacher was both cantor and shochet  In the Middle Ages, the Jews lived in the Schwäbisch Hall and on the southernmost section of the filled-in "Blockgassenkochers".. The village belonged until 1914 to Bezirksrabbinat in Braunsbach. They used the Jewish Cemetery in Steinbach, now incorparted in the town. Around 1880 was the peak Jewish population, 263 people out of a total of 9,222. 1933: 115 of 11,239  Afterward, any of them left under the repressions of the Nazis, while others were deported between 1941 and 1942. The 19th century Jewish community in Schwäbisch Hall held services in Steinbach. For a prayer room, they bought Upper House Herrengasse 8 in late 1892 The prayer room on the western side (front) of the building behind a shop on the ground floor that opened on 22 September 1893 was used for ordinary services with festivals still celebrated in Steinbach. The house in the Upper Herrengasse 8 also contained a school hall and a small apartment for the rabbi. The prayer room was demolished in the November 1938 pogrom. Local Nazi party officials destroyed the interior and burned religious objects and inventory in the marketplace.  After WWII, three camps for displaced persons were created where around 1,300 Jewish people were housed, but not in Schwäbisch Hall. Most emigrated to Israel. The camp existed until beginning of 1949. After 1990, Jews mainly from the CIS countries moved here. The Schwäbisch Hall Jewish community authority is Württemberg (IRGW). The building itself was restored in 1985 and carries a billboard. In the marketplace remembers David Stern with explanatory text on the events of 1938. The current Jewish community in Schwäbisch Hall uses premises in the old abattoir for their services.  [Mar 2013]

JEWISH CEMETERY:

Jewish dead of Steinbach initially were buried in Schopfloch (Ansbach),and since 1747 in Braunsbach . Since 1809, a separate cemetery was at the Steinbacher Road. The cemetery was completely destroyed in the Nazi era, only some of the gravestones could be reerected. 1947 memorial commemorate the victims of the Hessental concentration camp and the victims of persecution Schwäbisch Hall. (cemeteries 35.03 a; Lgb.-Nr. 418/1, 419/2 and 431) history and photos and articles. [Mar 2013]


Website of the Central Archives Heidelberg: the Jewish cemetery Steinbach

Photos of the Jewish cemetery in Steinbach at the site of Matthias Lauterer

Henry Kohring : The Jewish Cemetery in Schwäbisch Hall Steinbach. Introduction, Hebrew, translations, photos and register. Schwäbisch Hall 1996th ISBN 3-927374-16-4.

Eva Maria Kraiss / Marion Reuter : Bet hahayim. House of Life. Jewish cemeteries in Württembergisch francs. Künzelsau 2003rd . ISBN 3-89929-009-7 
(Webmaster's comment: Extremely beautiful and informative images and text strip with excellent photos of the cemeteries in Berlichingen Braunsbach, Crailsheim, Creglingen Dünsbach, Hohebach, Krautheim, Ljubljana, Michelbach the gap Niederstetten , Öhringen, Steinbach, Weikersheim)

 

74523 Baden-Württemberg (Gerz, Peters)

DISTRICT: Schwäbisch Hall.
LOCATION OF CEMETERY: Steinbacher Strasse (Detail).
IN USE: From around 1809 until 1948.
NUMBER OF GRAVESTONES: 121.
DOCUMENTATION:
  • 1985 photographs of all gravestones with listing and mapping of graves, including some translations of gravestone inscriptions by Eva-Maria Kraiss.
  • 1986-1993 photographs of gravestones, copies and translations of all gravestone inscriptions and cemetery layout by Schwäbisch Hall.
  • 1990 cemetery documentation by Landesdenkmalamt based on manuscript by Heinrich Kohring.
  • 1991 photographs of all gravestones and mapping of graves by Zentralarchiv.
  • Numerous photographs of individual gravestones and general cemetery views in Alemannia Judaica.
PUBLICATIONS:
  • Photographs of two gravestones in Württemberg 1932, page 80.
  • Full cemetery documentation in Steinbach 1985. Juedische Gotteshaeuser und Friedhoefe in Wuerttemberg pub.by Oberrat der Israelitischen Religionsgemeinschaft Württembergs. Stuttgart 1932 (Deutsche Nationalbibliothek).
  • Gerhard Taddey: Kein kleines Jerusalem: Geschichte der Juden im Landkreis Schwaebisch Hall pub. 1992 pages 304, 311-312.(LBI).
  • Heinrich Kohring: Der juedische Friedhof in Schwaebisch-Hall Steinbach pub.1996 (LBI).
  • Eva Maria Kraiss and Marion Reuter: Bet Hachajim - Haus des Lebens : juedische Friedhoefe in Wuerttembergisch Franken publ. 2003 by order of Foerderkreises Haellisch-Fraenkisches Museum e.V. ISBN 3-89929-009-7 (LBI).
NOTES:
  • Prior to establishing their own cemetery in 1809, this Jewish community used the Schopfloch cemetery in Bavaria (in the district of Ansbach). From 1747 onwards the Braunsbach cemetery was also used.
  • During the Nazi era the cemetery was destroyed. From the original estimated 260-270 gravestones only 112 have remained to be re-erected after 1945.
  • The cemetery was desecrated in 1992, when 6 gravestones were toppled and 2 besmirched with swastikas.
  • There are several memorial plaques for the Jewish victims from Schwäbisch Hall and Steinbach who were murdered in the Hessental concentration camp, also for the Jews from the Staszów and other concentration camps.
SOURCES: University of Heidelberg and Alemannia Judaica.
(Researched and translated from German December 2008)