Nordhorn

The Nordhorn „Israelite community“ was only a small community, never had more than 50 members in about 12 families, which around 1900 corresponded to a population share of 0.8% (exactly corresponding to the average of the German Reich). Three professions were practiced by Jews: butcher / livestock dealer, textile dealer, old goods dealer.

Jews have existed in Nordhorn for over 350 years. In 1649, the settlement of a „Schutzjuden“ was reported for the first time. The Jewish families were well-liked in the neighborhood and in the circle of colleagues of the inner-city merchants; at least no reports of pogroms, of violent attacks or drastic discrimination are known from Nordhorn – for long stretches of history – as well as for the whole county –. Probably the reasons for this lie in the proximity to the more liberal Netherlands and the confessional diversity of Nordhorn. Thus a passive tolerance developed: One let the other be valid, but one was not particularly interested in him.

Before this historical background one can understand the shock of the year 1933. The Nazi government ordered hostility to Jews – and the population of Nordhorn and the county hardly resisted. Neighbors had become Jews overnight. Many Jews from Nordhorn died in the Shoah, the first being Moritz Schaap in Mauthausen in 1941, the last being Jenni Frank and daughter Else in the Stutthof concentration camp in 1944. Of the survivors, only Salomon Cohen and his family returned permanently to Nordhorn in 1953. He took over the slaughterhouse of his murdered brother Isaak.

A central memorial site is the memorial stone opposite the church „St. Augustinus“ in the Burgstraße. Since 1977 it has commemorated the synagogue destroyed in 1938 and the destroyed congregation, „as a reminder to the living“. A total of 36 stumbling blocks by the artist Gunter Demnig commemorate the North Horner*innen who perished under the Nazi terror.