The development of the Jewish community saw its heyday in the first three quarters of the 19th century. In 1805, 396 Jews (30.1%) inhabited the town, in 1831 – 497 (39%), in 1846 – 758 (35%), in 1871 – 851 (32%), and in 1876 – 959 (31%). However, this growth was followed by a period of decline, from 576 people in 1885 (18.8%) to 253 in 1910 (5.9%). In the 19th century, the Jewish community in Tuchola had jurisdiction over the entire area of the Tuchola District; in 1847, this comprised as many as 130 nearby villages. A synagogue was opened at the beginning of the 19th century. In 1837, it was deemed a collapse risk, so a plot of land was purchased for the construction of a new one on Zamkowa Street (Burgstraße). The new synagogue was consecrated on 20 September 1843. Other facilities of the synagogue complex – a bathhouse and a communal house – were erected on erstwhile Synagogalna Street (Synagogenstraße). Nowadays, this area is located in the vicinity of the Cultural Centre on Gabrychów Street.

The year 1859 saw the adoption of the so-called Synagogue Ordinance (Synagogen-Ordnung) in Tuchola. Some of the local rabbis were Samuel Isaac Caro (1828), Abraham Selig Karo (1829), Lipman Thorner (1831–1837), Salomon Horwitz (1837–1866), and Doctor Grünfeld (till 1920). The Chevra Kadisha funeral society (under the name Chewra Kadischa Verein) was active in the community, later transformed into the Society for Visiting the Sick and Organising Funerals (Krankenpflege und Bestattungverein). In 1870, the Israelite Women's Society (Israelitische Frauen Verein) was established. Several foundations conducted charity work. One of them was financed by Samuel Fabian.

Initially, Jewish children attended private lessons. In the 1820s, four unregistered teachers offered tuition from their homes. However, the pressure from the government induced the Jewish community to employ a licensed teacher, Salomon Stern. In 1834, a second class was opened at the local private Jewish school. In 1849, a public Jewish religious school with two teachers was established. In 1851, it was moved to a new building next to the synagogue. The facility operated until 1878, i.e. until the closure of all religious schools.

In the spring of 1900, anti-Jewish riots broke out in Tuchola and many other localities in West Prussia. They were triggered by an alleged ritual murder which was to have taken place in nearby Chojnice.

The situation of Jews in Tuchola changed significantly after 1920, when the town became part of Poland. The outflow of the Jewish population, which had already begun in the 1870s and 1880s, only intensified. Out of the 253 Jews who lived in Tuchola in 1910 (5.9%), 118 (2.7%) remained in 1921, 68 (1.8%) in 1925, and 51 (1.1%) in 1931. There were exactly 19 families in the town in 1931 (listed are the names of family heads): Icchak Rubinstein, Hersz Izbicki, Szram, Max Maschke, Lina Jakobius, Rytlewski, Herman Lewiński, Eliasz Braun, Seify, Lindenstrauss, Max Nasch, Bukofzer, Abraham Bluhm, Julius Rosen, Jakub Grynberg, Solbiger, Tobiasz Wygodny, Hoffer, Łęczycki. Other Jewish families lived in the surrounding villages, which were organisationally subordinate to the Tuchola religious community: Cekcynia (in 1931 – five people), Kęsowo (two), Śliwice (three), Rosochatka (six), Wysoka Wieś (four). In 1932, the Tuchola community was incorporated into the Jewish community in Chojnice, which took over all its property. In 1938, the enlarged community owned movable property worth 2,526 zlotys and immovable property worth 64,400 zlotys; its debt amounted to 2,000 zlotys. Just before the outbreak of World War II, only one Jewish family remained in Tuchola.

At the end of September 1939, the Germans carried out mass executions of the local Jews and Poles. They shot 47 Jews from the entire Tuchola District in Nowa Tuchola, in the field of the local Selbstschutz manager, Kurt Merten-Feddeler (nowadays the area holds allotments at Sępoleńska Street). Among the victims were: Cella Jacobius with a family of four, Hanne and Johann Maschke, Lewiński with his wife and child, and his daughter with her husband and their two children, Sally Rittlewski (Rytlewski) with her daughter, the Blum family of four (two daughters Frieda and Selma committed suicide before being arrested), Jona Blecher, the Roze couple, the Braun couple with a child, Johanna Schram with daughter and granddaughter, the Szwartz family of three, the local cantor Hersz Izbicki’s family of seven.

At the turn of 1940, the Germans demolished the synagogue, and then blew up its foundations in late November 1940. The same year, they also destroyed the cemetery; the tombstones were broken into cubes and used to pave the streets. Elijah Braun's house at the Market Square was pulled down in search of valuables. Virtually no traces have survived of the Jews of Tuchola. One of Berlin's museums holds the Torah Crown (Keter Tora) from the synagogue in Tuchola, founded by Emma Selbiger née Lewinnek. The crown was purchased at an auction in the United States. On 20 September 2010, a commemorative plaque was unveiled in Tuchola near the former synagogue. It bears the inscription: "In memory of the former inhabitants of Tuchola of Jewish nationality, murdered by the German occupier in the autumn of 1939.”

The Description

The Jewish cemetery in Tuchola was probably established in the early 19th century at today's 4 Towarowa Street (it was probably located on the parcel now marked as plot no. 1782/1), on the slope of the Kicz River valley. A map from 1933 shows that leading to it was a dirt road branching off from the road to Rudzki Most. It reached the Jewish cemetery and continued towards the military cemetery. The area of the Jewish necropolis, now difficult to determine, was ca. 3 ha or a bit more (3.89 ha according to the cemetery registry entry). At the turn of the 1930s, the cemetery consisted of four sections separated by lanes. It was most likely fenced. Included in its area was a house for the caretaker, the gravedigger's utility building, and about two empty morgens of land, probably intended for enlarging the cemetery. Apart from the local Jewish population, it was the burial site of Russian prisoners of war of Jewish faith from the nearby POW camp operating during World War I and the Polish-Bolshevik War.

After the war, the area of the cemetery, completely destroyed by the Germans, was taken over by the Rural Transport Cooperative in Tuchola. During construction works on warehouses and a petrol station, human remains in metal coffins were dug up. Currently, a construction materials warehouse is located on the former cemetery grounds.

Author of the note: Tomasz Kawski

Bibliography

• M. Aschkewitz, Zur Geschichte der Juden in Westpreussen, Mahrburg (Lahm) 1967.
• Z. Karpus, “Gmina Wyznaniowa Żydowska w Chojnicach w latach 1920–1939,” in: Gminy Wyznaniowe Żydowskie w województwie pomorskim w okresie międzywojennym (1920–1939), Toruń 1995.
• T. Kawski, “Inwentarze gmin żydowskich z Pomorza i Wielkopolski wschodniej w okresie międzywojennym (1918/20–1939),” Kwartalnik Historii Kultury Materialnej 2006, no. 1.
• G. Salinger, Zur Erinnerung und zum Gedenken. Die einstigen jüdischen Gemeinden Westpreußens, New York 2009, Bd. 2.
• Tuchola od pradziejów do współczesności, W. Jastrzębski, J. Szwankowski (eds.), Bydgoszcz – Tuchola 2010;
• W. Wołos, “Cmentarze żydowskie w województwie pomorskim w latach 1920–1939,” in: Gminy Wyznaniowe Żydowskie w województwie pomorskim w okresie międzywojennym (1920–1939), Toruń 1995.

Właściciel praw autorskich do opisu: Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich POLIN.