Moenchengladbach

Summary: Moenchengladbach’s 14th-century Jewish community was destroyed during the Black Death pogroms of 1349, when local Jews were either murdered or forced to flee. It was not until 1621 that a new Jewish community was established in the town. In 1856, Moenchengladbach became the center of a synagogue association; after 1870, its congregation was the largest in the region. Among the town’s notable Jewish residents was Avraham Gotthelf, who, in 1855, opened the city’s first weaving mill. The regional congregation was dissolved in 1890, after which the Moenchengladbach-Rheydt congregation was formed, together with a few independent satellite communities. Local Jews conducted services in prayer halls—all were located in private residences—until September 14-16, 1883, when a new synagogue was inaugurated on Karlstrasse (present-day 15-17 Bluechenstrasse). The synagogue housed a Jewish elementary school, and we also know that the community maintained a cemetery at Huegelstrasse after 1840 (near an older cemetery at an unknown location). The Huegelstrasse cemetery still exists. The Jewish population in 1933 was either 907 or 1,200 (sources of information differ), constituting 0.6% of the city’s total population. In 1933, a branch of the Maccabi sports club was opened in Moenchengladbach, with 60 members. Jewish stores were boycotted after 1933, and in July 1935, Jews were banned from public swimming pools (earlier than in the rest of Germany). On Pogrom Night, SA men set fire to the synagogue and its Torah scrolls; the fire department attempted to extinguish the blaze, but was prevented from doing so by the SA. Jewish homes and stores were also destroyed, and more than 50 Jewish men were sent to Dachau. In May of 1939, only 375 Jews still lived in Moenchengladbach. After 1941, Jews were deported to the ghettos in Lodz, Riga, Izbica, Lublin and Theresienstadt. Of the 638 deported Jews, only 27 survived the Shoah. A memorial plaque was later unveiled opposite the former synagogue site. The new Jewish community was established after the war, numbering 100 members in 1960 and 270 in 1993. In April 1967, the community established a prayer hall at Albertusstrasse.

Author / Sources: Benjamin Rosendahl
Sources: EJL, LJG, SG-NRW