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Midowa Street Cemetery (New Cemetery) - Kraków, Poland. 6311 burials total.
This cemetery, known as the "new" cemetery, was established in 1800, outside of the area known as Kazimierz, on land purchased by the Jewish community from monks. The cemetery was enlarged several times over the years and its total area before World War II reached 22 hectares (55 acres); today the area is 19 hectares (48 acres).
The cemetery is walled in and has a locked gate. It has a purification room near the gate. Today on the ground floor of the purification building are artifacts which were used in the purification of the deceased. The rooms on the ground floor across from the gate are used as living quarters by the watchman of the cemetery, who is also the gardener. Other Polish families inhabit the rest of the building.00
There are over 7,000 gravestones in the cemetery, of which about 25% are broken. Most of the inscriptions on the memorials are in Hebrew. The oldest monuments date from the 1840s. This cemetery has been in use since its establishment and until this day, with the exception of the Holocaust period.
The cemetery was desecrated during the World War and it was used as a training ground for German soldiers. In 1957 the cemetery was restored and a memorial was built of broken pieces from gravestones brought from different places in Poland, in memory of the martyrs of the Holocaust. Additional pieces of broken memorials which were found in the cemeteries and in the Plaszow work camp, were placed in the walls.
Submitted by the Association of Cracowians in Israel. | 
