«The last remnants of the Jewish rural communities.»

Dr. Uri R. Kauf­mann, an expert on Alsa­ti­an and sou­thern Ger­ma­ny Juda­ism is curr­ent­ly a Sigi Feigel lec­tu­rer for Jewish Stu­dies at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Zurich. He spo­ke to his­to­ri­an Dr. Bar­ba­ra Häne about catt­le tra­ding, mili­ta­ry ser­vice and the aban­do­ned buil­dings of the once exten­si­ve net­work of Jewish rural communities.

Bar­ba­ra Häne: Mr. Kauf­mann, you have been rese­ar­ching Jewish catt­le trad­ers who immi­gra­ted to Switz­er­land from Alsace and sou­thern Baden. How did they influence today’s Jewish communities?

Uri Kauf­mann: In the Swiss coun­try­si­de of 18th and 19th cen­tu­ries, Jews traded in many are­as, par­ti­cu­lar­ly live­stock. Live­stock tra­ding was a mat­ter of trust: Rela­ti­onships with cus­to­mers exten­ded over seve­ral gene­ra­ti­ons. When Jews were gran­ted the free­dom to sett­le in Switz­er­land in 1864/66, many relo­ca­ted to Swiss towns and cities in order to be clo­ser to their cus­to­mers. As ear­ly as 1805, Jews from Sund­gau foun­ded the Jewish com­mu­ni­ty of Basel. Many moved from Endin­gen-Len­gnau to the near­by small town of Baden and later to Zurich. Mean­while, Jews from Gai­lin­gen and Hohen­ems for­med the Jewish com­mu­ni­ty in St. Gallen.

BH: The Jewish urban com­mu­ni­ties flou­ris­hed – but what hap­pen­ed to the rural communities?

UK: Start­ing in 1850, the rail­road net­work expan­ded. Sud­den­ly, Alsa­ti­an vil­la­ges such as Hégen­heim, Nie­der­ha­gen­thal and Dur­men­ach found them­sel­ves iso­la­ted. Live­stock was traded along new trans­por­ta­ti­on rou­tes, and access to the rail­road was a signi­fi­cant advan­ta­ge. Busi­nesses swit­ched from small to lar­ge-sca­le trade, with eli­te asso­cia­ti­ons tra­ding good in much grea­ter num­bers. Rural trade and agri­cul­tu­re came under pres­su­re. Young men sought out more pres­ti­gious pro­fes­si­ons. Men who pre­vious­ly would have been pedd­lers beca­me tex­ti­le mer­chants. But poli­tics also had their impact, espe­ci­al­ly in Alsace: Alsace beca­me Ger­man in 1870. Many young Jewish men wan­ted to avo­id mili­ta­ry ser­vice in the Prus­si­an army and sett­led in Switz­er­land. The beau­tiful syn­ago­gue in Hégen­heim near Basel was lar­ge­ly deser­ted after 1912.

BH: Can you say a few words about Jewish-Chris­ti­an relations?

UK: Inter­de­no­mi­na­tio­nal rela­ti­onships are always com­plex. In the vil­la­ges of Endin­gen and Len­gnau, Jews and Chris­ti­ans inter­ac­ted exten­si­ve­ly in dai­ly life, but they didn’t inter­mar­ry. In unsta­ble poli­ti­cal times, anti-Semi­tic riots bro­ke out, for ins­tance when Jews deman­ded free civil rights in Endin­gen in 1861. In Alsace, this pro­cess took place ear­lier thanks to the French Revo­lu­ti­on, though civic equa­li­ty took a much lon­ger time to mani­fest in rural than urban are­as. Jewish schools, for exam­p­le, were not always reco­gni­zed as éco­les com­mu­na­les. Pogroms took place in Dur­men­ach and many other Alsa­ti­an and Baden towns after the Paris Revo­lu­ti­on of Febru­ary 1848.

BH: What is the lega­cy of the rural com­mu­ni­ties today? 

UK: The Jewish fami­lies from rural com­mu­ni­ties which relo­ca­ted to Switz­er­land in the 19th cen­tu­ry sur­vi­ved the Sho­ah. In France, the Alsa­ti­an town coun­cils moved their head­quar­ters to the south of the coun­try in 1939, which saved many lives (but left the com­mu­ni­ties in Alsace deser­ted). After the war, Jews with Alsa­ti­an roots retur­ned, most­ly to Stras­bourg, Col­mar and Mul­house. Jewish buil­dings, among them the for­mer syn­ago­gue in Hégen­heim (now an arts cen­ter) are the only tes­ti­mo­nies of the rural communities.

France on the other hand dis­se­mi­na­ted the myth of the French Resis­tance for a long time, which hin­de­red the coun­try in coming to terms with its anti-Jewish past until the turn of the millennium.

BH: Dear Mr. Kauf­mann, thank you very much for your insight.