Jewish cemetery Rastatt

The Jewish cemetery was inaugurated on 26.06.1881 by Rabbi Willstätter from Karlsruhe. Present were high-ranking representatives of  Grand Ducal and municipal authorities, the Catholic and Protestant city pastor, as well as many residents of Rastatt.

On 19.10.1941, the official order was issued by the Nazi regime, starting from the Rastatt District Office, to close the cemetery. The letter also referred to a decree of the Minister of the Interior.

On Oct. 30, 1941, the Baden Minister of Finance and Economics decreed that communities wishing to have the former Jewish cemeteries in their possession would have to pay a purchase price that was economically justifiable and justified. At that time, there were still 90 gravestones in the Rastatt cemetery.

The sales negotiations between the ministry and the city dragged on until January 1944 due to an administrative dispute. After that, the cemetery was offered to the city for lease, although a memo dated 26.07.1944 shows that the city was not interested.  Due to this fact, the cemetery was in 1944, apart from a few war damages, still almost in its original condition. A care of the cemetery had, due to the deportation of all Jews still living in Rastatt from 1940 to Gurs, no longer taken place.

In 1945, the American occupation forces returned the cemetery to its former purpose and repaired it.

The district administrator of the Rastatt district decreed on 01.06.1946 that all municipalities of the district had to repair and maintain the cemeteries of their former Jewish co-inhabitants in a dignified manner. The execution had to be reported to the Baden Ministry of the Interior in Freiburg by December 15, 1946. In Rastatt, the maintenance has since been carried out by the city gardening department, which the city council also decreed in 1946.