Jewish Cemetery, Wrzeszcz
The Jewish Cemetery in Wrzeszcz, a borough of Gdańsk, Pomeranian Voivodeship, Poland, was established in the 18th century. The cemetery on the northern slope of Królewskie Wzgórze (King's hill) on Romualda Traugutta Street is now a publicly accessible park. It is not a protected heritage site.
History
The first Jews settled in Wrzeszcz, outside the gates of the city of Gdańsk in the 1680s. By 1765, the Jewish quarter in the area had 230 inhabitants. The cemetery was established in the middle of the 18th century. Until 1775, it was administered by the chevra kadisha of the suburb of Stare Szkoty.
In 1775, administration of the cemetery was taken over by a newly established synagogue in the marketplace in Wrzeszcz, later known as the Old Synagogue . This synagogue remained in use until 1887, when the Great Synagogue was opened for all the Reform Jews in Gdańsk.
In 1814, during the Napoleonic Wars, the cemetery was largely destroyed and Wrzeszcz was incorporated into Gdańsk. The cemetery was re-established and restored to use in 1823.
Under pressure from the
For a long time it was rumoured that a stairway, called the 'Stairs of Shame' (Polish: schodami hańby), built on the hillside in the 1970s was made out of Jewish gravestones. In 2014, it was established that it is actually made of Christian tombstones.[1]
References
- ^ Schody do lasu: były z nagrobków, są z drewna trojmiasto.pl (poln.)
External links
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/30px-Commons-logo.svg.png)
- "Cmentarz żydowski w Gdańsku-Wrzeszczu (ul. Romualda Traugutta)". Virtual Shtetl (in Polish). Retrieved 2018-11-16.
- Danzig (Westpreußen) on Jüdische-Gemeinden.de