Enschede Synagogue (Achterstraat)

Społeczność żydowska

The Jewish community of Enschede grew slowly before industrialisation. Jews are first mentioned in the town in the mid-seventeenth century, and through the eighteenth century the local government kept strict limits on Jewish settlement. In 1748 there were 14 Jews, meeting for worship in a private house. In 1809 the community, which then described itself as eight small families, wrote to the consistory at Zwolle asking to be spared the cost of correspondence and requesting a teacher; the letter was signed by Alex Mozes. A teacher came later, during the reign of King William I. By 1813 there were ten heads of families, enough for a minyan, and in 1826 the community counted 42 members. In 1827 Alexander Mozes Jongbloed was appointed warden. Numbers then rose quickly, to about 110 when the Achterstraat synagogue opened in 1834 and 119 in 1840. The encyclopedia describes severe poverty in the early nineteenth century, with most Jewish breadwinners in petty trade; the textile fortunes of families such as Menko and Van Dam came later in the century.

Architektura i projekt

Almost nothing is recorded about the building itself. The sources consulted give no architect or builder, no dimensions, no seating capacity and no description of the exterior or the interior, and no drawing, photograph or plan of it has been found. It was built in 1834, at a time when Enschede was still a small, densely built country town of timber-framed and brick houses, and it was one of the buildings consumed when that town burned in 1862. A document published by the Stichting Cultureel Erfgoed Enschede states that in 1832 part of the community's old burial ground was sold to or exchanged with the municipality so that a synagogue could be built on what is now the Stadsgravenstraat. That suggests the Achterstraat synagogue stood on or near the line of the present Stadsgravenstraat, but this is an inference: the old street name has not been matched to a present-day street in any source read, and the exact plot is unknown.

Życie w synagodze

The synagogue was the religious centre of a small, mainly poor congregation that had only recently gained formal recognition. Its opening in 1834 was performed by Chief Rabbi A.I. Herzveld, and the building was paid for partly with money given by non-Jewish residents of the town, a sign of reasonably good relations with their neighbours. The congregation had no rabbi of its own in this period in the sources consulted; the only office-holder named is the warden Alexander Mozes Jongbloed, appointed in 1827. The community had already asked for a religious teacher in 1809 and later obtained one, but no source says where lessons were given. The names of the cantors and teachers who served the Achterstraat synagogue, its board members and the details of its services, customs and furnishings are unknown.

Zniszczenie

The synagogue was destroyed by accident, not by any act directed against the Jewish community. On 7 May 1862, a few days after a visit by King William III whose decorations were still hanging in the streets, a fire broke out early in the afternoon in the Kalanderstraat. Driven by a strong wind it spread rapidly through the closely built town. It destroyed 633 houses, 25 stables, 44 warehouses, eight factories and all of the public buildings, and left 3,675 of Enschede's roughly 4,500 inhabitants homeless, though no deaths were reported. Both the Jewish Historical Museum's encyclopedia and the Dutch Jewry database state that the synagogue burned down in this fire. Prints made after a photograph by C.E. Westenborg show the town as a field of ruins. The synagogue was not rebuilt on the Achterstraat: the congregation consecrated a new and larger synagogue on the Stadsgravenstraat in 1865, and where it worshipped in the three years between is not recorded.

Los społeczności

The community recovered quickly after the fire and grew with the textile industry, from 321 Jews in 1869 to 757 in 1899 and 931 in 1930. After the Nazi German occupation of the Netherlands in 1940, churches and the mayor of Enschede protested against the anti-Jewish measures and the local police at first refused to help with deportations, but the measures were carried out all the same. Jewish children were removed from public schools and a Jewish primary and secondary school were set up. Raids by the Nazi occupiers began in early October 1942, and in 1942 and 1943 more than half of the Jews of Enschede were deported; few survived the camps. A relatively large number went into hiding with help from the local Jewish Council and the resistance. More than 700 Jews from Enschede and its surroundings were murdered. A community was re-established after the war, with 425 members in 1951, and it still worships in the Prinsenstraat synagogue.

Miejsce dzisiaj

The Achterstraat no longer appears under that name on the map of Enschede, and its line has not been identified in any source consulted. The centre of the town was rebuilt after the 1862 fire, and nothing of the 1834 synagogue survives. A 1832 land transaction recorded by the Stichting Cultureel Erfgoed Enschede links the planned synagogue to the present Stadsgravenstraat, so the map pin for this entry is placed on that street; it marks a probable area, not the documented plot. The Stadsgravenstraat synagogue of 1865 that replaced it has also disappeared. No marker or fragment recording the Achterstraat synagogue is known. Enschede's present synagogue on the Prinsenstraat, built in 1928, is a national monument and is still used by the Jewish community.

Ważne postacie