Braunschweig, Germany

Braunschweig, Brunswick, Germany. First evidence of a Jewish presence dates from 1282 and in 1320 there was a community, which had a synagogue and comprised at least 24 families. In the Black Death persecutions of 1348-1349, more than half of the Jews were murdered, but the community continued to exist until its expulsion in 1510. In the 18th century a Jewish community started to develop again. In 1786 the Jewish population came to 206 and in 1812 to 379. The first Jewish town councilor took office in 1845. The community dedicated a new synagogue building in 1875. In the wake of immigration from Eastern Europe, the Jewish population grew to 710 in 1890, and 1,100 in 1927. In 1933, 980 Jews were living in Braunschweig. At the start of the anti-Jewish boycott, 1 April 1933, eleven members of the youth group of the Jewish War Veterans Association (RjF) were arrested and maltreated with one subsequently dying. The various boycott measures continued and by fall 1938, most Jewish businesses had been “aryanized”. Sixty-nine Jews of non-German citizenship were deported to Poland in October 1938. On Kristallnacht (9-10 November 1938), the synagogue was burned down, Jewish stores were wrecked, and 71 men were arrested and taken to Buchenwald concentration camp. At this time, 620 Jews remained in Braunschweig. About 200 managed to escape by 1941. The remaining Jews were billeted in “Jewish Houses” and deported in 14 transports from 1941. 377 Jews from Braunschweig were murdered in the Holocaust.