History:
The Schmieheim cemetery was established in
1682 to provide for the Jews moving into the
Rhine valley. Today, it is the largest
Jewish cemetery (140 ares) in Southern Baden.
A 1998 evaluation
of the cemetery determined there were 2950 burials, of which
459 were without gravestones. The oldest known
grave stone dates back to 1701, more than one
hundred years before Jews adopted
surnames. There may have been more
burials even earlier than 1701, without
surviving records. The earliest stones
exhibit only Hebrew writing, while the stones
from the middle of the 19th Century on have
Hebrew on one side and German on the
other. A World War I memorial still
stands in the cemetery ironically
demonstrating the loyalty of the Jews to their
German homeland. It was restored in 1998. The
ruins of building, destroyed on Kristallnacht,
can still be found in the graveyard.
During the
November 1938 Kristallnacht, its morgue
and other cemetery buildings were destroyed
and many grave stones were overturned and
destroyed. Even after WWII, desecration of
the cemetery continued at least until the
1980s. A council of the Jewish Community of
Baden-Emmendingen Ortenau is now responsible
for the Cemetery and has proclaimed it as a
historic landmark. The care of the cemetery
is in the hands of the municipality of
Kippenheim-Schmieheim. In May
1999 "The Jewish Cemetery in
Schmieheim" by Naftali Bar Giora, Bamberg,
was published. It includes photographed of
all the stones and inscriptions translated
into German.
Location and
Setting of the Jewish Cemetery:
The cemetery
lies on the road south from Kippheim toward
Walburg, just past Schmieheim itself. It is spread
over quiet grassy slopes with patches of
majestic cypress trees and surrounded by a
stone wall. This is
the final resting area of the Jews of
Ettenheim, Altdorf, Kippenheim, Nonnenweier, Schmieheim,
Rust, Orschweier, Lahr and Friesenheim.
In her 2008 book,
Ordinary
People, Turbulent Times, Alice
Dreifuss Goldstein wrote,
"The
cemetery for Altdorf's Jews was
located in Schmieheim, some 3
kilometers distant. It
occupied a grassy slope amid fields
and small woods and was truly a
place of peace. To reach it, the
Jews of Altdorf walked along a
narrow tree-lined road that curved
along the side of a hill. In a
funeral procession, the coffin was
often carried the entire distance on
the shoulders of a few men, although
sometime a cart was used."
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The geographical
location of the site can be guised from the
International Jewish Cemetery Project at the Kippenheim
Page
and at:
On
the Road From Kippenheim (SW) toward Wallburg,
at the fork to Altdorf
(Compare with Detail
Map
of Cemetery Location )
Photos:
Cemetery photos
containing additional information can be
found here.
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