Follow
This project is intended to catalogue the Jewish families living now or in the past in Chojna in the West Pomeranian Voivodeship of Poland that was formerly Königsberg in der Neumark "King's Mountain in the New March" in Prussia. It is a small town in northwestern Poland in the West Pomeranian Voivodeship approximately 60 kilometres (37 miles) south of Szczecin, Poland.
Note: Chojna, Poland was Koenigsberg, Prussia and is NOT to be confused with and is not the same as what was Koenigsberg, East Prussia during the relevant period (and is now Kaliningrad, Russia). This town was NOT in the Grand Duchy of Posen in 1834/35. Verified not in Luft's list of towns in the Grand Duchy.
Family Search has one microfilm for this town Catalog Number: 1857768 Items 1-3 Microfilm Number: 7991141 As of Late 2021 the entire microfilm collection of Family Search has been digitized and is available online with restrictions on some Poland records.
Family Surnames (Please feel free to add tree tops for new families)
- Carsten-- Louis (Elieser) (Was born Louis Cohn and is a descendent of Benjamin Israel Cohn (below) but changed surname)
- Cohn-- Benjamin Israel c. 1750
- Lester-- Philipp (Born in Berlin)
- Levin-- Moses c. 1750
- Wolf-- Moses b. 1725
From the International Jewish Cemetery Project:
"CHOJNA: Szczecin
Alternate names: Chojna, Chojny [Pol], Königsberg in der Neumark [Ger], Regiomontanus Neomarchicus [Lat], Königsberg in Neumark, Neumark, Königsberg, Koenigsberg. 52°58' N, 14°26' E, 32 miles SSW of Szczecin (Stettin), 53 miles NE of Berlin. Słownik Geograficzny Królestwa Polskiego (1880-1902), IV, p. 243: "Koenigsberg". Jewish population: 158 in 1880 and 31 in 1933. Also used Dabie cemetery. Village in the administrative district of Gmina Lubień Kujawski, within Włocławek County, Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship, in north-central Poland. [April 2009]
US Commission No. POCE00196
Cemetery: Chojna, gm. loco. Present 1990 population: 1,000-5,000, no Jews.
Town: Burmistrz; Stanislaw Gralak, Urzad Gminy i Miasta Chojna; tel. 14-12-95, 14-26-85; 74-125 Chojna.
Regional: mgr. Ewa Stanecka, Wojewodzki Konserwator Zabytkow ul. Kuinierska nr 20, 70-536 Szczecin, tel. 34-804.
Interested: dr Alojzy Kowalczyk, ul. Moniuszki 4/b, 73-110 Stargard, tel. 33-44-40 Stargard. Urzad Gminy i Miasta Chojna Wydzial Geodezji i Gospodarki Gruntami, 74-125 Chojna.
The earliest known Jewish community was 1846. The Jewish population before WWll was 1300-1520. The Jewish cemetery was established about 1850 with last known burial about 1944. The isolated urban flat land has no sign or marker. Reached by turning directly off a public road, access is open to all via a broken masonry wall and non-locking gate. The size of the cemetery before and after WWll is 0.30 hectares. 1-20 gravestones, none in original locations with less than 25% broken, date from 19th-20th century. The granite, sandstone, and limestone rough stones or boulders or flat shaped stones have Hebrew and German inscriptions. No mass graves exist. Municipality owns property used for recreation and storage. Adjacent properties are residential. Cemetery boundaries are unchanged from 1939. Occasionally, private visitors and local residents visit. The cemetery was vandalized during WWll. Restoration was carried out by local authorities in 1958-1960. There is occasional clearing and cleaning by authorities. There are no structures. Vegetation is a serious threat; security, erosion, and pollution are moderate threats.
Alojzy Kowalczyk, ul. Moniuszki 4/B, 73-110 Stargard, tel. 73-44-40 completed survey on 12 Oct 1991. Documentation: Baranowski, J. 1963 r. Cmentarze Zydowskie w Wojewodztwie Szczeciaskim, PP PKZ Warszawa. Kowalczyk visited the site 2 Oct 1991.
Update: There is nothing to see of the Jewish cemetery. No stones, no sign-nothing. I interviewed a librarian who told me that some years ago the town removed the stones to build a parking lot on the site for a nearby sports stadium but they didn't. Now, you can see only a grassy area. Source: Olaf Tessmann; oletess@berlin.snafu.de [April 1999]"
From the Local History section of Virtual Shtetl at sztetl.org.pl Accessed December 5, 2021
"
The beginning of the settlement in today’s Chojna goes back to the turn of the 7th and 8th centuries. In the 13th century the West Pomeranian Duke Barnim I brought colonists from Brandenburg there, and in 1255 Chojna was granted a town charter under Magdenburg Law. Beginning from 1270 the town was part of Brandenburg. Its name was Königsberg until 1945. At the turn of 13th and 14th centuries defensive walls with numerous turrets were built around the town During 1402-1455 the Chojeński Land was given as security to the Teutonic Knights. It was under Teutonic rule that social and economic as well as administrative and political aspects of Chojeński Land were shaped. That region was a scene of several military operations conducted by the Polish, Teutonic or Pomeranian forces, which in consequence led to the town’s devastation and depopulation. In 1455 the Brandenburg margraves purchased Chojeński Land from the Teutonic Knights. The 17th century witnessed more wars which caused destruction and decimated the population. Beginning from 1720 the town was part of Prussia.
In the first part of the 19th century the Chojnia county was established, which embraced the area on the left bank of the Odra River and the town of Kostrzyń.
During the 18th and 19th centuries the main occupation of the local people included farming and tree cutting. The development of the town was hampered primarily by its location, far from the main routes of the West Pomerania. Not until the second part of the 19th century did it gain a road and railway connection to the most important cities of the region. In those times Chojna was famous for the production of bells made by the Fischer’s family. They established a large foundry in the 19th century. The production of beer was essential to the town’s economy in those times. It is reflected by the fact that there were 92 breweries in 1808.
It is worth mentioning that a branch of the women’s concentration camp in Ravensbrück was established in Chojna in August 1944 near then airport construction site, where the camp prisoners worked. Most of the prisoners were women from Warsaw, who were taken to Ravensbruck after the Warsaw Uprising [1.1]. The women were placed in wooden barracks fenced with barbed wire. The camp had hospital barracks. The female prisoners were used to do earthworks for the construction of runways and aircraft hangars. As the front line was moving west, in March 1945 the women were sent to the Ravensbrück concentration camp on the death march. The prisoners from the hospital barracks were left in the camp, from where they were liberated by the Russian army.[1.2].
In March 1945 the town was seized by the Red Army. As a result of fierce fighting 75% of the town’s buildings were destroyed. Following the incorporation of the town into Poland the name Königsberg was changed to Chojna.
In 2004 the population of Chojna numbered 7,099 and its density came to 587.7 people per 1 km 2 [1.3]."
Bibliography:
Białecki T., Chojna i okolice na przestrzeni wieków, Zielona Góra 2007.