In the 1720s, a designated area for Jewish settlement – including a square of 39 ares and streets issuing therefrom – was marked out next to an already existing town of German craftsmen, chartered under the Magdeburg Law. In 1740, a Polish locality was founded around a nearby square covering almost a hectare. In 1745, the three settlements (German, Jewish, and Polish) were merged into a single urban centre called Przysucha. The town became a support base for the local iron ore mining and processing industry and started to dynamically develop.

At that point, the Jewish community in Przysucha already had a house of prayer, mikveh, and cheder. The local Jewish cemetery was established around 1745. It was located outside the developed urban development, to the northwest of the Jewish market square. An impressive brick synagogue was built in Przysucha in 1778.

In the second half of the 18th century, the Jewish population constituted the majority of the inhabitants of the town. In 1775, there were 189 houses in Przysucha, including 76 owned by Jews, 44 – by Germans, and 33 – by Catholics.

At the turn of the 19th century, Przysucha became an important centre of Hasidism, one of the first in central Poland. It was the seat of Tzaddik Yaakov Yitzchak ben Asher Rabinowicz, known as the Yid Hakudosh (Holy Jew) of Peshischa, a student of Dovid Biderman of Lelov and Yaakov Yitzchak HaLevi Horowitz, known as the Seer of Lublin. After his death, Rabinowicz was succeeded by his disciple Simcha Bunim. The two tzaddikim were buried in the cemetery in Przysucha, and their graves became Hasidic pilgrimage site. The local Hasidic court lost some significance after Simcha Bunim's death in 1827. Concomitantly, Przysucha was losing its industrial character based on mining and metallurgy and becoming more oriented towards trade and crafts. Despite these transformations, the town continued to develop, with the Jewish community growing at a particularly fast rate. In 1820, there were 1,150 Jews living in Przysucha, which accounted for 65% of the total population. By 1890, their number had increased to 2,770 (79.2%).

The local Jewish community was affluent enough to afford the construction of a new house of prayer with a bathhouse and rebuild it after it was destroyed in a fire. It also ran a nursing home for the elderly and disabled (which also partly served as a hospital) and a cheder, employed a rabbi, and maintained a cemetery.

The last burials in the local necropolis were held in 1942. During the liquidation of the ghetto in Przysucha on 27 October 1942, the Germans surrounded the quarter with a cordon and ordered everyone to report at assembly points. Those who remained in their homes were shot on the spot. The rest were driven on foot and on carts to Opoczno, where they were loaded onto trains bound for the Nazi German death camp in Treblinka.

A group of 60–80 Jews were left in Przysucha and organised into a forced labour unit. Their task was to bury all the people killed during the deportation action. The victims were laid to rest in a mass grave in the cemetery. This was probably the last burial in the Przysucha Jewish cemetery. In the summer of 1943, the grave was dug up by a special group of prisoners under the German command, who cremated the exhumed bodies.

The cemetery was devastated during the German occupation. The Nazis destroyed the fence and used matzevot as a building material, for example in the construction of a wall next to the military police post or a building at the back of the fire station. After the war, the cemetery continued to fall into decline and became overgrown with vegetation. Matzevot were stolen and used to pave roads and yards. The district authorities decided to transform the area into a park.

In 1987, the Nissenbaum Family Foundation carried out cleaning works at the cemetery. The plot was fenced and two ohelim were erected on its eastern side. One of them was placed over the grave of Abraham of Przysucha (died in 1806), preacher and one of the first proponents of Hasidism in central Poland. The other, double ohel holds eight brass plaques. Two of them commemorate the founders of the monument, while the others are dedicated to the memory of prominent tzaddikim associated with the Przysucha school: Yaakov Yitzchak Rabinowicz, known as the Yid Hakudosh (1766–1813), Simcha Bunim (1765–1827), Yerachmiel of Peshischa (1784-1836), Yaakov Yitzhak Elchanan (d. 1873), Yerachmiel Judah Meir of Peshischa (d. 1897) and Tzvi Hirsh Mordechai of Peshischa (d. 1865). Every year, the town is visited by Hasidic pilgrims associated with the Peshischa dynasty.

In 1989, the Provincial Monument Conservator entered the Jewish cemetery in Przysucha into the register of monuments under the number A-405, dated 3 April 1989.

The Description

The cemetery currently covers an area of 1.35 hectare and is densely overgrown with trees and unpruned shrubs. Ca. 20 fragments of tombstones have survived on the grounds, the oldest of which dates back to 1771. The wall by the police station built with the use of matzevot was pulled down in the 2010s. The recovered fragments were supposed to be transported to the cemetery, but they were never brought to the site. The wall of the building at the back of the fire station still holds pieces of tombstones. From time to time, residents of the town find pieces of matzevot during the renovation of backyards and roads and bring them to the cemetery.

Description copyright owner: POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews