Poppenlauer

Summary: The Jewish community of Poppenlauer conducted services in a prayer hall until 1867, when a synagogue was dedicated at 5 Gehrigsgasse; the building also housed classrooms for the Jewish elementary school, which closed down in 1924. The community owned a mikveh and an apartment building, but buried its dead in Massbach. In 1933, four children studied religion with a teacher from Massbach. A Jewish women’s association was active in the village that year, but it shut down soon afterwards as a result of the Nazis’ economic policies against the Jews. On the morning following Pogrom Night, 60 SA men from Massbach, accompanied by local SA members and many Poppenlauer residents, broke into and wrecked the houses of the village’s last nine Jewish families, after which the rioters destroyed the synagogue’s interior and ritual objects. Twenty-two Poppenlauer Jews fled abroad (many to the United States) and five relocated within Germany. In April 1942, 14 Jews were deported to Izbica (via Wuerzburg); and in July 1942, seven were sent to the Theresienstadt ghetto (also via Wuerzburg). The fate of three Poppenlauer Jews (they were presumably married to Christians) remains unknown. At least 20 Poppenlauer Jews perished in the Shoah. The synagogue building and the mikveh survived the Nazi period.

Author / Sources: Magret Liat Wolf
Sources: AJ, PK BAV
www.reinhardklopf.de/Juden1x.html