At the time the edict was issued, 13 Jewish families lived in Cieszowa.

Gaining civil liberties and freedom to choose where to live in the early 19th century resulted in an exodus of Jews from Cieszowa. In 1830, there were 45 Jews living in the village, while in 1845 there were 28.

On 23 July 1847, the Prussian authorities enacted the "Jewish Relations Edict".

In 1855, 18 Jews lived in Cieszowa (3.8% of the total population). In 1894, only 4 Jews remained in the village. In 1905, there were no Jews left.

The synagogue building was sold in 1908 to the parish priest of Cieszowa, Father Karol Urban. It was demolished in 1911.

The Description

The group of 18th-century Jewish cemeteries in Upper Silesia also includes the one in Cieszowa. It is a typical village cemetery, located west of the village centre, among cultivated fields, south of the road to Wierzbie and further to Lubliniec.

According to local tradition, at the beginning of the 20th century, the age of the cemetery was estimated to be around six hundred years, and the oldest tombstones there were thought to date from the mid-17th century. Undoubtedly, the number of years is significantly exaggerated and the necropolis much younger. This is evidenced by the fact that 17th-century tombstones have never been found and there are no reliable records of them either. It should absolutely be assumed that the necropolis dates from the second half of the 18th century.

The cemetery is situated on an irregular rectangular plot of land with an area of approximately 3,400 square metres. It is known that at the beginning of the 20th century it was enclosed by a wooden fence made of horizontally joined planks and the entrance to the cemetery was through a brick gate situated to the north and still existing. Neither a funeral home nor any other farm or residential buildings were ever erected there.

In 1909, there were approximately 120 tombstones in the cemetery. In 1917, the oldest identified one – which still exists today – was the one standing on the grave of Eliakim Gecel, son of Natan Note, who died on 24 November 1780. Currently, two more older stelae are known, one with the now illegible first name of a man who died on 4 December 1775, the other at the top of the grave of Menachem Manle, son of Yechiel, who died on 9 June 1780.

It is difficult to unequivocally determine how many people are buried in the Cieszowa cemetery, although it is possible that the number may fluctuate between 300 and 400 burials, including those of children.

In addition to the Jewish residents of Cieszowa, Jews living in more than 20 surrounding towns and villages that made up the local Synagogue precinct were also buried in the cemetery.

Due to the progressive disappearance of the Jewish community in Cieszowa itself from the mid-19th century onwards and eventually the complete disappearance at the beginning of the 20th century, the cemetery was used at that time mainly by the residents of the surrounding towns and villages, mainly Koszęcin and Woźniki. The last buried person from Cieszowa was a twenty-three-year-old merchant, David Deutsch, who died on 22 April 1900. On the other hand, the most recent identified tombstone crowns the grave of seventy-eight-year-old butcher Joseph Majud, who died on 9 April 1906 in Ligota Woźnicka. It is most likely that individual burials still took place there until the early 1920s.

In December 1913 – due to numerous organisational problems – the process of liquidation of the Jewish religious community in Cieszowa began. The cemetery eventually became the property of the community in Lubliniec. It remained under its care until the outbreak of World War II, which it also survived virtually intact.

After World War II, the cemetery – left unattended – gradually deteriorated, driven also by human factor. In 2002, the cemetery was fenced and cleaned up.

Author of the note: Sławomir Pastuszka

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