Nentershausen

Summary: In 1810, the Jewish community of Nentershausen established a synagogue on Unter den Linden. The community also maintained a schoolroom, a mikveh—located in the “shepherd’s house” near the synagogue after 1885/86—and a cemetery, the last of which must have been consecrated in the mid-19th century, for its oldest grave, a child’s grave, is dated 1849. Hesekiel Freudenberg of Abterode served as teacher until 1869, as did Max Mendel Katz, from 1884 until 1934, when he moved to Frankfurt. By 1933 the Jewish communities of Solz (two Jews lived there in 1933) and Imshausen (one Jewish family) had been affiliated with the Nentershausen community; Solz had been affiliated since 1900. The community maintained a chevra kadisha and a sisterhood, and although the elementary school had been closed by 1932, three children received religious instruction that year. On Pogrom Night, the interior of the synagogue was destroyed, Jews were assaulted and private property was damaged. (Today the United States Holocaust Museum houses the synagogue’s damaged Torah Ark.) In 1939, the synagogue was sold to a private buyer for the paltry sum of 600 Reichsmarks. Willi Katz immigrated to Ecuador and another community member, Bacharachs, moved to Lower Silesia. In 1942, the remaining Jews were deported, via Kassel, to the East. At least 55 Nentershausen Jews perished in the Shoah. Joseph Abraham, of Solz, perished in Theresienstadt on September 24, 1942. The synagogue was later used as a storehouse, a workshop and a shed. Eventually restored, it was opened to the public in 1996. In 2001, the Jewish cemetery was desecrated—28 headstones were overturned—by four youths from Bad Hersfeld.

Author / Sources: Esther Sarah Evans
Sources: AJ, EJL, JVL
www.geschichtsverein-rotenburg.de/
home.arcor.de/christenjuden/presse/HNA_Erinnern.pdf