JCR-UK

Birmingham & District Community

Updated 6 November 2006

City of Birmingham
and the Boroughs of Solihull and Walsall

Birmingham, in the English Midlands, is the second largest city in England, with a population of approximately one million. In the vicinity of Birmingham are a number of towns whose Jewish communities have looked to the Birmingham community for support or shares facilities, including Walsall immediately to Birmingham's northwest and Solihull immediately to Birmingham's southeast.

Until 1974, Birmingham, Solihull and Walsall were county boroughs, the first two in the county of Warwickshire and Walsall in the county of Staffordshire. Each then became metropolitan boroughs within the newly created metropolitan county of West Midlands (the areas of Solihull and Walsall being increased at the time by the incorporation of adjoining areas). These metropolitan boroughs became unitary authorities in 1986, when West Midlands lost its administrative county status, becoming purely a ceremonial and geographical county. Solihull had been an urban district until 1964, when it received county borough status.

Jewish Community

The following congregations are, or were, considered to be part of the Birmingham & District Community

Birmingham Central Synagogue (active)
Birmingham Hebrew Congregation (active)
Birmingham Home for Aged Jews Synagogue (closed)
Birmingham Lubavitch Centre (active)
Birmingham New Synagogue (closed - merged with Birmingham Hebrew Congregation)
Birmingham Progressive Synagogue (active)
Birmingham's first Jewish congregations (to 1856)
Midland Reform Synagogue Movement (closed 1970)
Solihull & District Hebrew Congregation (active)
Walsall Hebrew Congregation (closed)

The following are former or alternative names of the above congregations:

Beth Hamedrash - see Birmingham Central Synagogue
Birmingham Liberal Jewish Synagogue - see Birmingham Progressive Synagogue
Froggery Synagogue - see Birmingham's first Jewish congregations
Hurst Street Synagogue (1800's) - see Birmingham's first Jewish congregations
Hurst Street Synagogue (1900's) - see Birmingham New Synagogue
Park Road Synagogue - see Birmingham New Synagogue
Severn Street Synagogue - see Birmingham's first Jewish congregations
Singers Hill Synagogue - see Birmingham Hebrew Congregation
Wrottesley Street Synagogue (1800's) - see Birmingham's first Jewish congregations
Wrottesley Street Synagogue (1900's) - see Birmingham Central Synagogue

Articles on the Birmingham Community

Birmingham from "Provincial Jewry in Victorian Britain" - Papers for a conference at University College, London, convened by the Jewish Historical Society of Great Britain, prepared by Aubrey Newman - 6th July 1975. Reproduced here with his kind consent.

A Portrait of Birmingham Jewry 1851- Birmingham Jewish Local History Study Group

The Rise of Provincial Jewry - Birmingham by Cecil Roth, 1950. Available on JCR-UK as part of the Susser Archive.

Jewish Encyclopedia article on Birmingham by Joseph Jacobs and Leopold J.Greenberg, c-1906.

Birmingham Jewish Communities - History and Reality (at http://www.brijnet.org/birmingham/history.html) by Arthur Chesses.

Jewish Population Data

1730
1851
1895
1909
1934
1946
1955
1965
1990
2004

- First Jewish settlement (possibly earlier)
- 752 (Professor Aubrey Newman)
- 3,000 to 4,000 (The Jewish Year Book 1896)
- 5,000 (The Jewish Year Book 1910)
- 6,000 (The Jewish Year Book 1935)
- 6,000 for Birmingham and 49 for Walsall (The Jewish Year Book 1947)
- 6,300 (The Jewish Year Book 1956)
- 6,300 (The Jewish Year Book 1966)
- 3,500 (The Jewish Year Book 1991)
- 2,343 for Birmingham and 389 for Solihull (The Jewish Year Book 2005)

Other Birmingham Information

Jewish Property and Heritage & Places of Local Interest

Local Research Libraries, Bibliography and other sources

Birmingham Cemetery Information

Warwick Medieval Jewish Community

If you have anything to add to this section please contact JCR-UK

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