Synagogue (Ellrich)

Article in the magazine "Menorah" 1926 issue 9 p. 528: "The synagogue in Ellrich. The many small Jewish communities in Germany, with their peculiar physiognomy, have been increasingly doomed in recent decades. Among them is the community of Ellrich, a small town on the edge of the southern Harz on the shortest route from Hanover to Thuringia. Here, about half a century ago, lived a small but valuable Jewish community. It probably did not produce famous Jewish leaders, but among its members were some almost classic types of harmoniously formed personalities, in whom there was no dissonance between life and teaching, and whose memory lives on even today among all who were fortunate enough to enjoy their company. Now the community is dying out. A few families are left who are unable on their own to rebuild the community. The weak organization of the Jewish community in Prussia, which is in its infancy, cannot bring much help either. But still in Ellrich stands the old synagogue, a monument of earlier great sacrificial joy; but it too is close to becoming a victim of time. The exterior of the rectangular building is in a state of severe neglect: the roof and walls are damaged and full of cracks and fissures. The interior shows even more clearly the traces of the slow decline; the paintings faded, the carving broken in many places, the metal chandeliers damaged. In a few years the building must become a ruin if no helping hand supports it. The synagogue of Ellrich, however, should be preserved in the overall Jewish interest, because it is an artistic cultural monument. This is the beautifully carved almemor, the peculiarly decorated oron hakodesh with the large carved lion, the abundant decoration of the walls with sayings from the Bible, the inscription under the women's shul, which has not yet been fully elucidated and which seems to indicate an earlier rav coming from Vilna, the peculiar latticing of the women's shul, which harmoniously divides the room, the candlestick work, which is reminiscent of Russian or Polish emblems of arms.  
If the synagogue of Ellrich falls to ruin, a source would be destroyed from which we can receive knowledge of the wanderings of the Jews in Germany and Europe, the cultural elements which they brought with them from distant lands and recycled. The determination of the artistic sources, from which the individual inventory pieces of the synagogue of Ellrich take their origin, would be a grateful task for the Jewish art historian and ethnographer. Wouldn't it be important to preserve this important monument for the historical knowledge of Judaism? The synagogue of Ellrich and even many synagogues of the declining small Jewish communities in Germany, which are threatening to crumble into ruins, could become historical cultural sites through the helping hand of the community, which would show the Jewish youth their own history in a meaningful way.   
Afterword: The editors of the 'Menorah' have gladly given space to these remarks. As in Ellrich, elsewhere - in Germany, Czechoslovakia and in the Eastern states - valuable Jewish cultural assets, which generations have guarded, have been abandoned to oblivion and decay. But before the organized help of the whole can begin, all friends of Jewish life should draw the public's attention to this remnant of disappearing Jewish homes. We would like to publish any information and always ask you to attach pictures of sacral or profane buildings (also interiors) as well as individual objects. Upon request, we will reimburse costs of photographic recording. The Editor."    

         
During the November pogrom in 1938, the synagogue, so valuable in terms of art history, was devastated and subsequently demolished. Of the building is nothing more preserved.