West Ham Jewish Cemetery

The Jewish Cemetery at West Ham is a Jewish Cemetery in West Ham, London, England.

The cemetery was established in 1856 by the New Synagogue on Great St. Helen's soon joined by the Great Synagogue in Duke's Place, both London congregations.[1]

There are a number of notable people buried here, in a graveyard visually dominated by the imposing Rothschild Mausoleum.[1]

One section contains graves removed to this burial place from the former Hoxton burial ground of the Hambro Synagogue when that site underwent urban redevelopment. The oldest legible tombstone in this section dates from 1794.[1]

In 2005 a number of monuments were destroyed and graves desecrated in what the police described as an attack by anti-Semitic vandals. The doors of the mausoleum were pounded with heavy iron bars until they were bashed in, then they were torn from the building.[2][3]

Notable burials

War Graves

There are 5 Commonwealth service war graves here, 4 from World War I and one from World War II. A German soldier (prisoner of war) and two German civilian internees from the former war are also buried here.[4]

References

  1. 1 2 3 Sharman Kadish, Jewish Heritage in England : An Architectural Guide, English Heritage, 2006, p. 35
  2. ↑ "The shocking face of anti-Semitism at a West Ham cemetery yesterday: the 117th attack on a Jewish graveyard in 15 years", Marie Woolf, The Independent, 16 June 2005
  3. ↑ "Defaced, the Rothschild mausoleum that has stood for 140 years" at the Wayback Machine (archived September 23, 2009). Louis Jebb, The Independent, 16 June 2005.
  4. ↑ CWGC Cemetery report. Breakdown obtained from casualty record.
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