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About 350,000 Jews lived in Czechoslovakia before the NAZIs seized the country after the Allies signed the Munich Agreement with Hitler. About one-third lived in Bohemia and Moravia. Jews in Czechoslovakia had full civil rights, enjoyed the same civil rights and religous freedom as all other Czech citizens. We have few details about Jews in Czechoslvakia, but believe that they were highly assimilated. Note the Jewish boy on the dress page. Sudeten Jews were subjected to NAZI Germnlaws and regulations when after Munich Hitler seized the Sudetenland. Hitler subsequently seized Bohemia nd Moravia (March 1939). At this time Slovakia suceeded from Czechoslovakia and the country ceased to exist. The NAZIs set up the Protectirate of Bohemia nd Moravia. NAZI official von Neurath issued anti-Jewish decrees (June 21, 1939,). They were practically identical to the regulations in forcein the Reich itselelf. As in Germany the regulatins were designed to terminate all civil rights and confiscate asmuch Jewish oroperty as possible. The measures quickly succeeded in destroying the economic viability of Czech Jews. The NAZIs were chillingly effective in their efforts to destroy Czech Jews in the Holocaust. After the NAZI victory in Poland, launching World War II, deportations began to concentration camps set up in Poland (October 1939). The death camps were operational by mid-1942 and by October 1942, about 75 percent of Czechoslovakian Jews had been deported, most of who were murdered at Auschwitz.
Describing the history of Jews in medieval Czechoslovakia is complicated because the country if course did not exist until 1918. And the area of what became Czechoslovakia was ruled by different political regimes and had a variety of ethniciities and religious affiliations. The Jews of central Europe shared many different experiences. All of the central European people lived and interacted with German and Jewish minorities. By far the most important minority was the Germans with their larger numbers and cinnections with German states to the west. One 19th centurybCzech historian wrote that much of Czech history revolved around confrontation and cooperation with the Germans. [Palacky] The Jews while smaller in number also played a role during the medieval period. The Jews were destinct in that unlike the Germans they did not operaste entirely within the existing society. They were separated by religion, language, and custom. The Jews in the region steadily increased after Western Europe became increasingly hostile to Jews at the time of the Crusades and plagues. Most of the Jews were Ashkenazi (western or German Jews). The greatest number of Jews migrated to Poland, but others settled in what is now Hungary and Czechoslovakia. The influx of Jews east is strong evidence that the living conditions and opportunities for Jews were in Hungary as well as Poland, Bohemia and iother areas of Central Europe were far better than in Western Europe. The legal status of Jews in Bohenia was the same as in Hungary. Jews were legally serfs of the royal exchequerer (servi camerae). [Wandycz, p. 25.]
Prague at the end of the mediveal period (early-17th century) had become a kind of capital for European Jewery. [Wandycz, pp. 9-10.] And while conditions varied, Eastern Rurope proved much more hospitable that Western Europe.
Prussia defeated Austria in the Austro-Prussian War (1866). As a result, Austria was essentially expelled from the German community of states. The Hungarians moved toward independence, but were persuaded to remain in the Austrian empire, but with enhanced rights. The official Settlement (the Ausgleich) created the Austro-Hungarian Empire which was a dual monarchy (1867). Emperor Franz Josef was crowned at impressive ceremony in Budapest with the crown of St. Stephen. He was thus the first Hungarian king in centuries.
The Hapsburgs recreated Austria as the Dual Monarchy--the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Austria-Hungary became a large multi-ethnic empire dominated by a German and Hungarian ruling class. The Empire dominated much of central Europe, including all of which would become Czechoslovakia after World War I. Because of the complicated constitutional regime of the Dual Monarchy, Jews were goverened under varying legal structures depending on where they lived in the Empire. Jews in what would become western Czechoslovakia (largely Bohemia and Moravia or the modern Czech Republic) Czechoslovakia) lived under Austria jurisdiction. The Austrians passed a new law governing Jews (1890).
The Hugarians who ruled what would become the eastern regions of Czechoslovakia (largely Slovakia) also issued a new law affecting Jews.
The communal leadership in both aeeas initially primarily favored assimilationist with German (Austrian), Hungarian, or Czech culture.
Austria seized control of the Carppethian Mountains as a result of the First Polish Partition (1772). Carpatho-Russia was the northeastern corner of the Austro-Hungarian Empire which bordered on Russian controlled Poland, Russuian-controlled Ukraine and Romania. During the late-19th and early-20th century, large numbers of Jews emigrated into the region from Tsarist Russia which launched a series of pogroms and otherwise repressed their Jewish population. The number of Jews in Carpatho-Russia inreased almost fivefold because of migration from Galicia (a Polish region divided between Russia and Austria), Romania, and Russia. Unlike Jews in other areas of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Jews in Carpatho-Russia largely lived in rural villages even as late as the Czech 1930 census. This was the highest proportion of Jewish rural population in Europe.
The Czechs in the final days of World War I declared independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire and established a republic. Czechoslovakia was a rare democratic state in central Europe. There were about 350,000 Jews in Czechoslovakia, roughly 2.5 percent of the overall population. About one-third lived in Bohemia and Moravia. Jews in Czechoslovakia had full civil rights, enjoyed the same civil rights and religous freedom as all other Czech citizens.
The Czech Jewish population with the exception of the extreme east (Carpatho-Russia) was urban. More than 80 percent of the Jews in Bohemia and Moravia-Silesia lived in towns (with over 5,000 people and 60 percent in the larger towns and cities (over 50,000 people). The largest Jewish communities were in Prague and Brno (Bruenn). After independence, large numbers of Czech Jews moved from the small towns to larger towns and cities, becoming more concentrated. Small towns reported declines in Jewish popultions ranging from 20-50 percent. Many of these Jews moved to Prague, Brno, Ostrava, and industrial centers in the Sudeten area increased. Jews played a major role in Czech economic life. The were an important industrial leaders. They were especially important in the textile, foodstuffs, and wood and paper industries. One estimate suggests that 30%–40% of the total capital of Czechoslovakian industry was Jewish.
Jewish life varied considerably in Czechoslovakia depending on where they lived in the country. In the former Austrian administered areas (Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia) Jewish children mostly attended the public attended by Czech children. There were Jewish elementary schiools in Prague and Ostrava for parents who desored a more Jewish education. The only Jewish secondary school was in Brno.
In formerly Hungarian-administered Slovakia, the situation was different. Slovakian towns commonly had Jewish elementary schools which were taught in Hungarian. After theccreation of the Czechoslovakia, most Jews in Slovakia adopted the Slovak language. In the more traditional and rurl east of Czechoslovakia (Carpatho-Russia), Jews attended the traditional heder and yeshivah.
We have few details about Jews in Czechoslvakia, but believe that they were highly assimilated. Note the Jewish boy on the dress page.
About 28,000-33,000 Jews lived in the Czech Sudetenland. Some escaped. They were aware of what occurred in Austria after the Anscluss. About 12,000 of Sudeten Jews left either before or immediately after the Whermacy entered the Sudetenland (October 1938). Jewish organizations and religious communities and their property and wealth in the Sudetenland were doomed from the moment the NAZIs seized control. [ Osterloh] The speed of events after the Munich Accords (September 1938) meant that many were unable to flee before the Whermacht entered the Sudetenland. They thus found themselves in NAZI hands. Sudeten Jews as thge Sudetenlahnd became part of the Reich were subjected to NAZI 1935 Nuremberg race laws and regulations that goverened Reich Jews. Only a few weeks after the NAZIs seized the Sudetenland, they staged the vicious Kristallnacht pogrom throughout the Reich (November 1938) As occurred elsewhere in the Reich, synagogues were burned, leading Jews were sent to concentration camps, and Jewish shops ad homes looted. vArmed with census lists, NAZI officials proceeded with actions against the remaining Jews and tge Aranization of Jewish firms and property. The Sudetenland proved to be the most "pro-Nazi" region in Germany based on NAZI Party membership. The Sudeten Germans with their knowledge of Czech and pro-NAZI leanings were after the German invasion of Czechoslovakia (March 1939), employed in the administration of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia as well as in various NAZI security agencies.
Czechoslovakia was first dismembered by the German seizure of the Sudetenland under the Munich Accord (Octgober 1938) and then partitioned when the Germans invaded in violation of the Munich Accords (March 1939). The Holocaust thus proceeded differently in the differnt sections of Czechoslovakia established by the NAZIs. Jews that remained in the Sudentland were placed under the sane regime as Reich Jews. Hitler subsequently seized Bohemia and Moravia (March 1939). At this time Slovakia suceeded from Czechoslovakia and the country ceased to exist. The NAZIs set up the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. NAZI official von Neurath issued anti-Jewish decrees (June 21, 1939,). They were practically identical to the regulations in forcein the Reich itselelf. As in Germany the regulatins were designed to terminate all civil rights and confiscate asmuch Jewish oroperty as possible. The measures quickly succeeded in destroying the economic viability of Czech Jews. The NAZIs were chillingly effective in their efforts to destroy Czech Jews in the Holocaust. After the NAZI victory in Poland, launching World War II, deportations began to concentration camps set up in Poland (October 1939). The death camps were operational by mid-1942 and by October 1942, about 75 percent of Czechoslovakian Jews had been deported, most of who were murdered at Auschwitz.
Osterloh, Jörg. Nationalsozialistische Judenverfolgung im Reichsgau Sudetenland 1938-1945. (München: Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, 2006).
Palackı, František.
Wandycz, Piotr S. The Price of Freedom: A History of East Central Europefrom the Middle Ages to the Present (Routledge: New York, 1993), 330p.
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