In 1526, Silesia came under the rule of the German emperors. In 1562, the sejmik of the Duchy of Opole and Racibórz passed a resolution obliging the Jews to sell their houses, pay off debts, and leave the duchy within a year. Jan Krzysztof Prószkowski, the owner of the town, stood up for the Jews, wishing for them to stay in Biała Prudnicka. As a consequence, Biała became the only town in Upper Silesia allowing free Jewish settlement. Over time, it came to be called Judenzüelz (Jewish Biała). In 1600, 26 Jewish families lived in the town.

On 13 April 1601, the Jewish community in Biała received a special privilege from Emperor Rudolf II, obliging the city authorities to provide legal protection to Jews. A few years later, the new owner of Biała, Count Hans Christoph von Proskowski, confirmed the privileges of the local Jews. The situation of the Jewish community in Biała was finally regulated by the imperial privilege of 17 July 1699. Jews were allowed to reside in the town and freely engage in trade throughout the Duchy of Silesia.

In May 1713, Emperor Charles VI issued an edict of tolerance allowing Jews to settle in Silesia after paying a special tolerance tax. Jews from Głogów and Biała were exempt from it. In the 18th century, the community in Biała owned a wooden synagogue at erstwhile Judengasse, a cemetery, and a school. It employed a rabbi and had an independent court system.

The change in the position of the Jews was related to the First Silesian War and the peace signed in Wrocław on 11 June 1742, as a result of which most of Silesia found itself within the borders of the Kingdom of Prussia. In 1742, about 1,000 Jews lived in Biała.

On 22 April 1769, the synagogue and the surrounding Jewish houses in Biała Prudnicka were destroyed in a great fire of the town. In 1774, a new brick synagogue was built.

In 1780, 1,001 Jews lived in Biała (49.2% of the total population). In 1782, the community comprised 1,061 people (52.5% of the total population), and in 1787 – 1,366 (48% of all Silesian Jews). At that time, it was the only town in Germany with a Jewish majority.

The driving force for the development of the Jewish community was the Edict on Civil Relations proclaimed on 11 March 1812 by King Frederick William. This document, introduced a fundamental change in the position of the Jews in the Kingdom of Prussia, partially equating them in legal terms with Christian citizens.

In 1828, there were 1,109 Jews living in Biała. On 23 July 1847, the Prussian authorities passed the Act on Jewish Relations.

In 1856, 411 Jews lived in Biała.

In the following years, the community shrank so much that by 1910, the town had only 20 Jewish residents, in 1925 – 14, and in 1935 – 12.

On 15 August 1914, the Synagogue Community in Biała was dissolved and incorporated into the Community in Prudnik.

Adolf Hitler’s rise to power in 1933 significantly changed the situation of the Jewish population throughout Germany.

During the so-called Kristallnacht of 9/10 November 1938, organised pogroms against the Jewish population took place throughout Germany. The wave of violence also swept Biała, where the synagogue was set on fire.

At the outbreak of World War II, there were no Jews left in Biała.

The Description

The Jewish cemetery in Biała is the oldest surviving Jewish burial site in Upper Silesia with a determined location. It is also the oldest active Jewish necropolis in the region and the largest in terms of the number of adult burials.

The cemetery is located south of the town centre, on the western slope of the Kopiec Hill, also known as Schwedenschanze, between the road to Prężna (currently Ogrodowa Street) and the Biała River. However, we know that the cemetery had already been opened by the turn of 1622, which is confirmed by the oldest surviving tombstone. Discovered in 1984 by Jan Paweł Woronczak, the matzevah commemorates Estera, daughter of Symcha, who died in the year 5382 (1621/1622). It is currently impossible to determine whether another Jewish necropolis had been active in Biała before the establishment of this cemetery. According to some unsubstantiated hypotheses, in the early 16th century a Jewish burial site existed north of the city walls, in the so-called Przedmieście Nyskie.

As the cemetery was steadily filling up, the Jewish community expanded its area five times over the course of its existence. The first transaction was concluded on 5 June 1644, with the kehilla purchasing additional land worth 40 Silesian thalers. It probably did not last for long, because two more plots of land were incorporated into the necropolis as early as November 1680, the first purchased from Mayor Christoph Bräuer for 38 thalers, and the second bought from the city, measuring 26 by 20 ells and worth 20 thalers. Sixty years later, the cemetery must have started to once again run short on available space, as on 19 August 1744, another parcel was purchased from Franz Eichler for 20 thalers. The last expansion took place in 1810, on March 26, with the community buying a plot measuring 24 by 12 ells from Franz Motzecki for 33 thalers, 10 silver groschen, and 6 pfennigs. It is impossible to determine the exact location of these particular sections of the necropolis. Nevertheless, it was at the beginning of the 19th century that the cemetery reached its final shape of an elongated irregular quadrangle and an area of 5,460 square meters.

Until the first decades of the 19th century, the cemetery also served the Jewish population of numerous towns in the western part of Upper Silesia and eastern outskirts of Lower Silesia which did not yet have their own burial sites. Until 1798, it was used by Jews from Brzeg, until the turn of 1814 and 1815 by Jews from Głubczyce, Koźle, Nysa, Opole, Racibórz, and Ziębice, and until the early 1820s also by those living in Głogówek, Krapkowice, and Niemodlin. In 1861, the Jews of Prudnik ceased to use the necropolis in Biała after founding their own cemetery. Jews from Korfantów and Opawica buried their dead in Biała for the entire period of the burial site’s existence.

According to local reports from the 1920s, a total of about 3,000 people were buried in the cemetery, probably only adults. This number is very difficult to verify, although it seems reasonable. Making precise estimates is made difficult by the fact that the burial registry was already considered lost in 1926.

With the gradual shrinking and eventual disappearance of the Jewish community in Biała, the number of burials in the local cemetery had been systematically decreasing since the mid-19th century. On 15 August 1914, the Jewish community in Biała was officially dissolved by the decision of the president of the Opole District, with the local Jews becoming members of the community in Prudnik. Although the cemetery and all other property of the community in Biała were taken over by its successor, this fact was never recorded in the land and mortgage registers. The last burial at the local necropolis took place in 1938.

Already at the end of the 19th century, the cemetery became an object of interest for historians. Due to its long history and the artistic value of the tombstones, it was documented in several photos taken in the 1920s and 1930s, both from the outside and from the inside of the cemetery grounds. As the photographs show, the state of preservation and maintenance of the site was relatively good, quite typical for such old cemeteries. The sloping terrain undoubtedly resulted in some stelae starting to slightly lean. This was also the case of the fence surrounding the grounds – the one in the photos was put up in 1883 in the form of wooden boards installed between brick pillars. According to archival sources, the area of the cemetery had also been protected with a wooden fence in 1688. The site was accessed through a brick gate, probably built as early as the 17th century and renovated at the turn of 1840, as explained on the commemorative plaque embedded in one of its pillars. The rectangular pre-burial house, restored in 1747 or 1749, was located in the north-eastern part of the cemetery. It initially had an annexe with the watchman’s residential quarters. At the turn of 1826, a new house was erected for the caretaker at the entrance gate, as explained on the board placed by the building.

In 1935, Faber, a rabbinical student from Wrocław, took inventory of the cemetery, recording a total of 997 stelae. It should be noted that these were not all the tombstones present at the site, as some graves were marked with both primary and secondary stelae – in such instances, Faber listed them under a single item. The oldest recorded tombstone stood on the grave of Yehuda Leib, son of Tanchum Meinster Friedland, who died on 18 December 1689. The documentation also points out that the cemetery originally held many more gravestones, mainly wooden, but they had been completely destroyed due to the poor quality of the material, and only some had been replaced with new stone monuments.

The most difficult period in the history of the cemetery came at the end of the 1930s. In the events of the Kristallnacht pogrom of 9/10 November 1938, over a hundred tombstones were knocked over, and the wooden spans in the fence were destroyed. No information has been preserved on what happened to the buildings standing at the site. On 9 December 1938, the mayor of Biała issued a formal letter to the Jewish community in Prudnik, requesting it to carry out repairs at the cemetery. The community immediately took appropriate steps and commissioned retired magistrate building adviser Kurt Wolff from Bytom to visit the cemetery and assess the damage. Eventually, only a part of the overturned tombstones were put upright. Further works were suspended after the mayor issued a ban on entering the cemetery.

On 30 March 1939, by order of the mayor of Biała, the cemetery was closed for burials. The board of the Prudnik community appealed the decision with the president of the Opole District (through an intervention of the local governor of Prudnik). On 21 June 1940, the mayor's order was annulled. However, the very same day the president of Opole District closed the cemetery himself for public safety reasons, acting in accordance with the regulations on the competence of state and district police bodies adopted on 1 October 1931. Following these administrative steps, it was decided that in the event of the death of the last Jew living in Biała, Leo Riesenfeld, his funeral would be organised in Prudnik.

In June 1940, there were over a hundred overturned tombstones in the cemetery. The Jewish community was unable to take any action to return them to their original position or to carry out any of the planned repair works. On 4 July 1939, the necropolis formally became property of the Jewish Association in Germany represented by its local office in Gliwice. However, an entry regarding the change of owner was only made in the land and mortgage register on 23 February 1943. On June 10 of the same year, the area was seized by the Gestapo and handed over to the district tax office. Until 1945, the cemetery remained unsold. It survived the war in a relatively good condition.

After the end of World War II, the cemetery was supervised by a caretaker who lived in the cemetery buildings. Insufficiently tended to, the site was slowly falling into decline, but it has survived in a relatively good condition to this day. Only the fence and buildings have not been preserved, with only the foundations remaining. The cemetery has been mowed regularly for many years.

Author of the note: Sławomir Pastuszka

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