Buchen
General information: First Jewish presence: 1337; peak Jewish population: 150 in 1862; Jewish population in 1933: 38
Summary: The Jewish community of Buchen was formed after the
pogroms of 1348/49. The first synagogue, inaugurated in
1700, burned down in 1861, after which (in 1864) local
Jews inaugurated a new synagogue with a mikveh and an
elementary school. In 1889, however, disaster struck again
when another fire inflicted major damage on the building
and Torah scrolls. We also know that the cemetery at Buchen-
Bodingen served Buchen and the surrounding Jewish
communities, and that local Jews employed a teacher and
maintained several associations.
Although the synagogue had been sold in the summer
of 1938, the Nazis still destroyed its interior on Pogrom
Night. The scrolls were spared, having been transferred to
Karlsruhe beforehand. Of the 38 Jews still living in Buchen in 1933, eight emigrated,
13 relocated within Germany, three died of natural causes, one
committed suicide, five were deported to Gurs from elsewhere
and 10 were sent to Gurs from Buchen (in October, 1940). At
least 18 Buchen Jews perished in the Shoah.
After the war, the synagogue housed refugee families.
In 1951, the building was converted into an apartment. A
plaque was unveiled there in 1983; and in 2006 a memorial
square was named after Jacob Mayer, a poet and community
leader who committed suicide in 1939.
Photo: Cantor Willi Wertheimer in the synagogue of Buchen. Courtesy of: State Archive of Baden-Wuerttemberg, Stuttgart.
Author / Sources: Esther Sarah Evans
Sources: AJ, SG-BW
Sources: AJ, SG-BW
Located in: baden-wuerttemberg