Jew'S Cemetery, Walls And Ohel

GREENDOWN PLACE, Combe Down (East side)

07/03/06 Jews' Cemetery, walls and Ohel (formerly listed as GREENDOWN PLACE, Combe Down, Jewish Burial Ground and Chapel)

GV II

Jewish Cemetery including walls, gates and Ohel (chapel). 1836, built of coursed rubble. The cemetery occupies a rectangular site running for approximately 30m east- west along Bradford Road and bounded by Greendown Place to the west and No.174 Bradford Road (qv) to the east. The site, surrounded by tall (approx. 2.5m) rubble stone walls on the north, west and south, is accessed via hooped-iron gates on Greendown Place, to the right of which lies the Ohel. The Ohel is a single room, gabled building built of stone rubble with some ashlar to the eastern façade. The Ohel originally had a pantiled roof (tiles in store at time of inspection 2005); the stone coping to the south gable remains. The Ohel is entered through a plank door on the north gable end and there is a two/two sash window on the western façade fronting Greendown Place. There is a truncated gable end stack on the south side. Internally, a plain stone surround to the fireplace remains on the eastern wall, to the right of a blocked doorway. The cemetery contains approximately fifty memorial stones, including two chest tombs. A stone plaque set in the southern wall is no longer legible. A small square opening, since blocked in, on the northern wall opposite the Ohel may have accommodated a basin for the ritual washing of hands of visitors to the cemetery. HISTORY: The land was purchased from Henry Street in 1812 and it is not known when the cemetery was opened but it is likely to have been circa 1836, before the opening of the Kingsmead Street Synagogue. The earliest gravestone is dated 1842, the latest 1921. SUMMARY OF IMPORTANCE: This is one of only fifteen cemeteries surviving from the Georgian period in the country. The cemetery is notable for the survival of its Ohel(chapel) and the presence of two chest tombs. Despite a prolonged period of neglect since the closure of the cemetery in the early C20, the (approximately) fifty tombstones, walls, gate and Ohel remain essentially intact and the cemetery survives as an important reminder of one of the smaller social minority groups within Bath society.

Listing NGR: ST7548962373