Walls Enclosing Jews' Burial Ground

Boundary walls to the Jews' Burial Ground, Ipswich, built around 1764 with later repairs. The burial ground was in use from 1796 to 1855.

The walls are constructed in red brick and enclose the cemetery on all four sides. Access is provided by an iron gate on the east side. Two boundary marker stones set into the walls are said to date from the reign of George II: one on the exterior right side of the entrance gate marks St Clements Parish, and the other, in the internal left corner of the north wall, marks St Mary Key. A buttress is present on the inner side of the north wall.

The burial ground contains 36 tombstones in limestone, marble and Yorkstone, arranged in seven rows largely in chronological order. There are also three smaller footstones. The stones are all upright with inscriptions in Hebrew or Hebrew and English. Some stones have broken at the top, and weathering has rendered the inscriptions on many unreadable. The earliest dated tombstone is from 1797/8 (Jewish year 5558), and the latest from 1850. The stones commemorate members of the Ipswich Jewish community and Jews from Harwich, Bury St Edmunds, Colchester and London. At least three stones are dedicated to children.

History

A Jewish community existed in Ipswich during the Middle Ages but dispersed when Edward I expelled the Jews from England in 1290. Jews returned to England at Cromwell's invitation in 1656, initially settling in London. During the Jacobite Rebellions, some Jews left London to establish trade in port towns, including Ipswich. By 1750, Ipswich had an established Jewish population worshipping in a rented room. By 1792, the congregation numbered at least thirty families from Ipswich and the surrounding area. They built a synagogue on a site in Rope Lane (now Rope Walk), erected through the generosity of two benefactors, Simon Hyam and Lazarus Levi. Many members of the congregation were shopkeepers and tradesmen involved in garment selling and watch making.

Having built their synagogue, the community acquired a cemetery. On 6 May 1796, they purchased a 999-year lease on an enclosed plot of land in the parish of St Clements from a bricklayer named Benjamin Blasby for £28 and a peppercorn rent. The walls of the enclosure had been erected by at least 1764 and the site was then known as Rogers' Court after its owner. Eight trustees were appointed for the cemetery, headed by Simon Hyam and Lazarus Levi, and including two Colchester residents. The number of burials is unknown, as more graves were evidently present than tombstones. One notable burial was that of Sarah Lyon or Lyons, who died in 1808 at the age of 105. She was famous for her longevity and John Constable painted her portrait in 1804 when she was 101 years old. She was said to be the earliest Jewish settler in Ipswich in modern times.

By 1830, Ipswich had no more than fifty Jewish residents and the synagogue was in poor repair. By 1867, it had fallen into disuse, and in 1877 it was demolished. When Hermann Gollancz visited Ipswich in 1895, only three Jewish people remained in the town. Two decades later, the Ipswich Jewish community existed only in memory. The burial ground was closed on 1 July 1855 under the Burial Act, and a Jewish plot was acquired in the municipal cemetery for future burials. After closure, the burial ground fell into disrepair; by 1879 it was in a deplorable state, having been converted into a poultry yard and later a refuse dump. In 1893, the London Committee (now Board) of Deputies of British Jews took over responsibility for maintaining the site. The Ohel (prayer hall) once attached to the burial ground had fallen into such neglect that a neighbour had claimed it as his own property.

The Board of Deputies undertook numerous repairs to the brick walls in the late 19th and 20th centuries, including rebuilding the top of the north wall after a severe gale in 1895, and rebuilding the west wall in 1912 and 1918. By 1912, the firm R & W Pauls (later BOCM Pauls) owned all the land and buildings surrounding the burial ground. After the Second World War, the adjoining tenements were demolished, but the burial ground was preserved and maintained by BOCM Pauls for the Board of Deputies.

Four separate surveys have recorded the inscriptions on the tombstones and their locations: by Rev. Francis Haslewood, Anglican Rector of St Matthew's (1875-1900); by Rev. Hermann Gollancz, a Jewish minister (1895); by Dr Nicholas de Lange and Sarah Montagu of the University of Cambridge (1980); and by Alan Coleman of Suffolk College (2001). No tombstones have been removed since the late 19th-century surveys.