It also included Jews from neighbouring Grochowo (2.6 km from Trzemieszno), and later also from Glisno (ca. 10 km) and Lubniewice (ca. 14 km). They mainly earned their living as traders, making good use of the proximity of the border and the town’s location on the old trade route from Frankfurt an der Oder to Poznań.

A wooden synagogue was built in Trzemeszno in the second half of the 18th century. At the time, Jews possibly constituted some 30–40% of the town’s population. In 1823, they built a new synagogue opposite the former one. It was a building made of fieldstones, on a rectangular plan, with plastered corners and pointed arch windows, covered with a hip roof. In the early 1830s, a Jewish school was built next to it. There was also a ritual slaughterhouse in the town. The synagogue underwent full renovation in 1881, but nothing is known about its furnishings. It was still active in the 1930s, located at erstwhile Hauptstraβe (nowadays 50 Poznańska Street). After the war, the building was converted into a shop and a local social club. It was pulled down after a fire destroyed it in the second half of the 1990s.

In 1911, Alfred Berliner, a Berlin-based industrialist associated with the Siemens company, became the owner of the Trzemeszno estate. He converted to Lutheranism and married a non-Jewish woman. His brother Eugen, married to a German woman, also lived in the palace which was part of the estate. Later, after Hitler’s rise to power, marriages with the "Aryan” women protected both brothers from Nazi persecutions. They both died a natural death before the end of World War II. The Berliner Palace was burnt down by the Red Army in February 1945.

In 1910, there were only 24 Jews in Trzemeszno Lubuskie. The drop in numbers was related to the wave of economic migration to the west of Germany. In 1932, there were 27 Jews living in the town, but according to the memoirs of Pastor Otto Berendt, some of them converted to Lutheranism and or were related to families considered "Aryan." In October 1942, only one Jew lived in Trzemeszno, probably protected as a husband of an "Aryan” woman.

The Description

The Jewish cemetery is located ca. 100 meters from the main road to Sulęcin, by a forest road leading to the military training range. Its area is 0.4 hectares. It was founded in the first half of the 18th century. Apart from the Trzemeszno community, it was also used by Jews from Lubniewice and Glisno. In the 1930s and 1940s, it was vandalised by the Nazis.

Nevertheless, the cemetery is relatively well preserved. Its area is surrounded by a wall made of fieldstones, ca. 80% of which has survived. The layout of the quarters and the main avenue is still visible. An inspection of the cemetery carried out in August 2007 registered 37 standing and 26 lying matzevot, 10 bases without plaques, 10 grave framings, and one child’s grave. However, another inspection in April 2010 showed only a dozen or so standing matzevot made of granite and sandstone, embellished with bas-reliefs and inscriptions in Hebrew and German. The oldest one dates back to 1796, and one of the newest – to 1930 (it stands on the grave of Max Gutermann, the owner of the largest store in Trzemeszno). These figures, however, may turn out to be underestimated, as currently (2020–2021) cleaning and inventory works are being carried out at the site by the Action Reconciliation Service for Peace, a German peace organisation. The activities are coordinated by the University of Potsdam and the Museum of the Międzyrzecz Land. Once the works are completed, their results will be published on the website "Jewish Cemeteries in Poland in the Former Province of Brandenburg." Nowadays, the cemetery in Trzemieszno Lubuskie is owned by the State Treasury and is managed by the Sulęcin Forestry District.

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