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JEWISH CEMETERY
The first Jewish cemetery in Lodz was established in 1811 and was
situated in Wesola Street. A fast growing Jewish Population caused the
cemetery to fill up and it was necessary to establish a new one. In 1892
the new Jewish cemetery in Bracka Street was opened - today the biggest
Jewish cemetery in Europe.
During more that 100 years of the history of the cemetery, many
meritorious members of the Jewish community were buried here, like
rabbis, industrialists, teachers, doctors, scientists, politicians and
social activists. Their graves are very often an authentic stonecutting
and blacksmith work art. Here also are buried the victims of the one of
the most tragic events in the history of the Polish Jewry - the
extermination in the Ghetto Lodz. Witness to this tragedy is a big
Ghetto Field and 6 pits next to the cemetery wall prepared for the
burial of the last shot Jews of the Ghetto.
Since the beginning of its existence, the Foundation Monumentum Iudaicum
Lodzense took a special interest in caring for the cemetery. The
Foundation covers the costs of the regular maintenance works, cleaning
the cemetery quarters from the overgrowing vegetation and adapts it to
the original architecture of the cemetery.
The Foundation also supported the conservations of the main gates and
the reparation of the roof of the Funeral House. Through the financial
help from the Polish-German Cooperation Foundation "Pojednanie" and the
Eternal Remembrance Foundation the damaged fragments of the cemetery
wall were repaired.
Through development of Zagajnikowa Street during the 50's damaged part
of the cemetery, thanks to the government's subvention, received a fence.
A substantial help to the Foundation comes from the Municipality of the
City of Lodz.
The Foundation Momentum Iudaicum Lodzense makes renovations work of the
Jewish Cemetery tombs. The reconstruction program takes care especially
of the tombstones and mausoleums of a great historical and artistic
importance. In this framework, the cupolas of the Silberstein family
grave was secured and work on the re-construction of the grave of family
Jarocinski are in progress.
The Foundation finances also the research works on the cemetery. Mr.
Dariusz Dekiert, the scholarship holder of the Foundation, made a full
inventory of the part of cemetery call "The Old Field". This research
showed the existence of the graves before 1892, what means before the
official date of establishing the cemetery.
In 1998 the Foundation started the efforts to give the Jewish Cemetery
in Lodz the status of the Monument of the Polis Culture.
You are welcome to visit a page specifically devoted to the cemetery
in Lodz ...more
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