Note: This article originally appeared in the December 2018 edition of Listen.

In the last edition of Listen, Priscilla wrote about the history of our Czech Scroll and invited members to accompany her to a special Shabbat service at Nottingham Liberal Synagogue which is held every year to commemorate their receipt of another of the Czech scrolls in 1965 – and to remember those members of the Synagogue from which it came who were killed during the Nazi occupation of  World War 2.

On 17th November Henry Fried and I took up Priscilla’s invitation and travelled up with her to Nottingham to attend the service.

The Czech Scrolls, for those who are not aware, was a collection of Torah scrolls, numbering over 1500, that were collected or stolen from the Synagogues of Jewish communities in what is now called the Czech Republic and stored in a cellar in Prague after the war and forgotten until a group of London Jews from Westminster arranged to bring them over to London for restoration and eventually redistribution.

One of our scrolls came from this collection and we obtained it in 1985. Ours is number 970 and came from a Synagogue in Pacov. Six other scrolls from the same Synagogue found their way to communities in the United States and South Africa.

Nottingham’s scroll was numbered 886 and the records showed that it came from the town of Austerlitz. Nottingham Liberal Synagogue developed a strong relationship with Austerlitz (now known as Slavkov ) with community group visits to the town and involvement in events to remember the Jewish community there.

It later emerged that there were two Czech scrolls with the same number and that the other one was from Austerlitz and theirs from Kamenice! So the Nottingham Liberal Synagogue then decided to forge a link with that town too. While doing their research they discovered that there had been another scroll from Austerlitz –number 1199, but that it had gone missing. Eventually it was found in the defunct theology department of Leeds University and brought to Nottingham. So then they had the genuine article: one scroll from Austerlitz, and one from Kamenice – and still had a strong and genuine reason for continuing their link with Austerlitz.

As Priscilla wrote in her article in Listen, we learnt that Nottingham was having a special Shabbat from Student Rabbi Anna Posner, who led our Yom Kippur services, and whose mother attended our services. She is a member at Nottingham and was interested to learn that we too had a Czech Scroll.

When we heard about the special Shabbat we offered to bring our Czech Scroll up with us so that both theirs and ours could be used in the service and all their communities of origin remembered.

The Shabbat service was led by their Rabbi, Tanya Sakhnovich, and Priscilla and I were given mitzvot – I processed our scroll and Priscilla had the second Aliyah. Rabbi Anna read from both scrolls.

Within the service a group of the community’s youngsters, who had been on the Synagogue’s most recent visit to the towns of Austerlitz and Kamenice, told of their inspirational and memorable experiences, meeting people from the towns who now want to celebrate the Jewish heritage of the region.

Later Kaddish was also recited to remember those from those towns who died in the Holocaust.

After the service there was a lovely Kiddush, and we were also treated to a very generous buffet lunch. So there were lots of opportunities for chatting and sharing. While at the event I spoke to the Chairman of the Memorial Scrolls Trust and he told me that there was exciting news about Pacov where our scroll came, from which I describe below.

Our scroll

A couple of years ago an American woman whose family came from Pacov visited the town and the former Synagogue which was now standing rather worn out and damaged. She began a campaign, together with the Toledot Foundation in Prague that houses the history of the Jews throughout Bohemia and Moravia, to set about restoring the Pacov Synagogue, and turning it into a memorial or museum celebrating the Jewish connection and contribution to life in the town over many centuries.

The Mayor and Council of Pacov responded enthusiastically to the idea, and over the last two years there has been a fundraising campaign to turn the dream into a reality. There have been a number of events to raise awareness of the project – and the important part Jews had played in the town for several centuries. This month we heard that that the Tikkun Pacov Synagogue Association are now the official owners of the old synagogue building. They are now raising money to restore the building so as to make it a significant Jewish landmark.

Our Czech scroll is a constant reminder of the communities that were destroyed and lost during the war and it is great that a relatively new community like ours has the benefit of owning and using it.

Maybe, one day, in the not so distant future, a group from our Synagogue will visit Pacov and the restored Synagogue.  If anyone is interested in helping to organise such a visit, please let me or Priscilla know.

I think our interest has been fired and we might sign up for such a trip.

The Synagogue will be making a donation to the restoration project. If you would like to make a personal donation or find out more information, please look at their website: Tikkun Pacov.

by Stan Cohen