Obj. ID: 13362
Jewish Funerary Art Jewish Cemetery in Radomsko, Poland
According to ESJF European Jewish Cemeteries Initiative, the cemetery is located about 2.1 km north-east of the city center at 196 Przedborska Street, and covers an irregularly shaped plot of 2.5419 ha. According to various sources, the cemetery was established between 1805 and 1832. The oldest preserved tombstones dates back to 1831.
In 1866, tzadik Szlomo ha-Kohen Rabinowicz, the founder of the local Hasidic dynasty, was buried at the cemetery. An ohel was erected over his grave, where members of the Rabinowicz family were buried in the following years.
During World War II, the cemetery was the site of many mass executions. The Germans shot at least several dozen people in October 1942, and about 1,500 in the first half of January 1943.
After 1945, the user of the cemetery was the Congregation of the Mosaic Faith in Częstochowa. Currently, the cemetery is owned by the Jewish Community in Łódź. It is one of the few active Jewish cemeteries in Poland. The last burial took place in 1990.
There are about 2,700 tombstones in the cemetery and a rebuilt ohel of the tzadik dynasty. There are mass graves of the Holocaust victims at the entrance. The area is fenced with a brick wall, with the main gateway and an additional entrance, from which the Kohen road leads to the ohel. At the main gate, a one-floor building has been preserved, which, before the war, served as a funeral house or a caretaker’s house. In 2017, a Hasidic center with a prayer room, a mikveh, and a hotel was opened next to the cemetery.
The cemetery is listed in the Register of Immovable Monuments. One can take the keys to the gate from the family now living in the former funeral house. The list of tombstones is available at https://sztetl.org.pl/pl/miejscowosci/r/518-radomsko/115-pamiec-w-kamieniu/30328-cięcz-zydowski-w-radomsku
There is a brick wall about 2m high. There are about 3,000 gravestones.
