Alternate names: Nieszawa [Pol], Nishava, ניישאווה [Yid], Nessau [Ger], Neshava, Нешава [Rus]. 52°50' N, 18°54' E, On the Wisła, 14 miles NW of Włocławek, 19 miles SE of Toruń. Jewish population: 333 (in 1862), 262 (in 1921). Słownik Geograficzny Królestwa Polskiego (1880-1902), VII, pp. 123-126: "Nieszawa". The town and a gmina n the Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship in north-central Poland had a June 30, 2004 town population of 2,047 people. Normal 0 The first documentation iof Jewish presence in Nieszaw was in 1487. However, in 1559 King Zygmunt August had granted a privilege that prohibited Jewish settlement in the city. However, five years later in a small Jewish community existed. Renewed Jewish settlement occurred around 1800. In 1808, 68 Jews represented 6.8% of the total population and dominated the local trade and crafts. Therefore, Jews contributes to the city's development and economic growth while garnering resentment from competing with other merchants and craftsmen. As a result, the local Polish population sought to ban Jewish settlement in the city. Accordingly, in 1828, the Administrative Board of the Polish Kingdom established the Jewish district in the city. Since then, Jews could settle to buy and build homes in strictly defined areas. Rarely, after meeting very demanding conditions, annually until the law ended in 1862, two Jewish families could live in any point of the city. In 1834, the 125 Jews living in Nieszaw formed kahal, initially subordinate to the Służew kahałowi paying them rent for with their mikvah and synagogue benches. Local Jews prayed in a rented room until building a brick and stone synagogue in 1849 on ulica Toruńska. The rectangular 17 meters in length, 11 meters wide and 6 meters high building was crowned with peaked roof covered with sheet iron. Then, difficult economic and post-WWI's economic crisis resulted in immigration to the US and Mexico and anti-Semitism for those who remained. Boycott of shops belonging to Jews meant a gradual decline of the Jewish trade. In 1917, thanks to Jewish merchants in Nieszaw, an American businessman built a factory, Toruński, yielding the city a considerable new equipment and expansion of the school and fire services. From 549 Jews in 1909 lived 549, only 262 Jews remained and only 80 by 1935. Maintaining the synagogue, cemetery, rabbi, shochet, and charity became impossible, forcing the Jewish community to connection with the Aleksandrowie Kujawskim Jewish community. Nieszaw and Aleksandrow Jews' diversity in religious and political outlook ultimately led to contention. In 1939, 35 Jewish families remained. Some fled into the eastern Poland at the outbreak of WWII. The Germans occupied on September 8,. 1939. On Sept. 14 (Rosh Hashanah), popularly known as Świętem Trąbek, the Nazis set fire to the synagogue. Several dozen Jews were arrested and their houses forfeit. In October, they were moved to Kutno. [June 2009]
CEMETERY: Established by lease of land in the about January 1819 in the valley of the Vistula River, south of the village, now ul. Narutowicza, surviving pictures from the 1930s show that it had a and wall. From the Vistula were two buildings, one for the caretaker/gravedigger. Gravestones faced east. Dominated by traditional, simple gravestones with triangular tops, some gravestones were columns and obelisks.The Nazis directed the destruction of the cemetery. They took all the marble tombstones and the fence and demolished a house. photos. [June 2009]