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JCR-UK is a genealogical and historical website covering all Jewish communities and
congregations throughout the British Isles and Gibraltar, both past and present.
NOTE: We are not the official website for this community.
Montefiore Mausoleum, Ramsgate
© David Newman 2017
Town of Ramsgate
Ramsgate (population about 38,000) is a coastal resort on the English Channel in
southeast England, which was particularly popular among both Jews and non-Jews
in the nineteenth century. In 1900, there were six kosher restaurants and
boarding houses. It is part of the Isle of Thanet, which, although
originally separated from the mainland by the Wantsum Channel, is now
practically joined to the mainland as a result of the build up of silt and
shingle. Ramsgate is in the local government district of Thanet in the county of
Kent, formed in 1974 by the merger of the municipal borough of Ramsgate with of
the municipal borough of Margate and adjoining areas.
The Ramsgate Jewish Community
Ramsgate’s first recorded Jewish family was that of Isaac Lyon, a silversmith,
who first appears in 1786, initially living in the High Street and later at 13 Harbour Street,
Ramsgate.
This family was followed quickly by Levi Abraham formerly of Portsmouth, a tailor, who had married Elizabeth Moses
from a Dover family. He had his shop first at 63 and then
at 70 High Street, Ramsgate.(i)
The earliest recorded circumcision of a Jewish child in Ramsgate was
in 1789.(ii) The Ramsgate Jewish community
was significantly enhanced by Sir Moses Montefiore taking up residence there in 1822 and
erecting the synagogue in 1833. Following Sir Moses's death in 1885, the small community declined but the town continued to have
a functioning synagogue thanks to financial support from the Montefiore Endowment and the scholars
attending Montefiore College (which moved to London in 1960).
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Jewish Congregations
The following are the Jewish congregations that exist or existed in Ramsgate:
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* An active congregation.
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Online Articles and Other Material
relating to the
Ramsgate Jewish Community
on JCR-UK
Some Notable Jewish Connections with Ramsgate
(provided with the assistance of Steven Jaffe)
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Beyond doubt, the most significant Jewish connection with the
town was great banker, financier, activist and philanthropist,
Sir Moses Montefiore (1784-1885) and
his wife, Lady Judith Montefiore (1784-1862),
who purchased their home and country estate at East Cliff,
Ramsgate, in 1831. Both are interred in the Mauseleum
adjoining the Synagogue established by Sir Moses in Ramsgate in
1833. Sir Moses, who was the longest serving president of the
Board of Deputies for British Jews, also established a Jewish Theological College in Ramsgate, which later moved to London.
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John Henry Amshewitz (1882-1942), artist and
caricaturist, was born in Ramsgate. He was the son of
Rev. Asher Amschejewitz* of the Judith
Lady Montefiore's Theological College in Ramsgate.
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Joseph (Joe) Barnett (1911-1967) was three times Mayor of Ramsgate, from 1961 to 1963.
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Lazarus Hart (1831-1917) was twice Mayor of
Ramsgate, in 1896 and 1897 (profile
on the Ramsgate Town website). The Lazarus Hart Havens of Rest,
alms houses, built between 1917 and 1922 on the Thanet Road in
Ramsgate, from a bequest by Lazarus Hart, were to be "shared by
Jews and Gentiles". The houses are a Grade II Listed Building,
listed on 4 February 1988 (number 1086061).
View
description on Historic England website.
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Harry Marks, MP (1855-1916), financial
journalist and newspaper proprietor, was Conservative MP for the
Isle of Thanet (including Ramsgate) 1904-1910, having previously
represented St George, Tower Hamlets (1895-1900). He was the son
of
The Rev. Professor David Woolf Marks,*
the first minister of the West London Synagogue.
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Benjamin Norden (1798-1877), a pioneer of Jewish settlement in South Africa, who became a leading explorer,
investor, developer and trader, retired to Ramsgate in 1858 and died there. He is buried at the Jewish cemetery in Ramsgate which he bought for the community in 1872.
(Profile on JewishGen's Southern Africa SIG website.)
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Sir Joseph Sebag Montefiore (1822-1903) (born Joseph Sebag who in 1885 took the additional name Montefiore by royal licence)
who was President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews 1895-1903, resided at East Cliff Lodge, Ramsgate, which he inherited from his uncle,
Sir Moses Montefiore. Founder of Joseph Sebag & Company, stockbrokers.
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For rabbis connected with Judith Lady Montefiore's Theological College, see
below.
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Kitchener camp - located approximately ten miles south of Ramsgate
and fourteen miles north of Dover, at Richborough military barracks, near Sandwich
(now in the Dover District), Kent, the Kitchener camp
(a disused military base from World War I) housed upwards to 4,000 mostly Jewish refugees from Nazi persecution
during its short period of operation, between 21 February 1939 and 26 May 1940. The camp was intended principally to accomodate
adult male refugees who had been released from concentration camps on condition of immediate emigration.
The renovation, equiping and feeding of the camp was the responsibility of the Central British Fund.
The spiritual welfare of the refugees was the responsibility of
Rabbi Werner Van Der Zyl* and a conservative rabbi.
While Chief Rabbi Hertz visited the camp, the camp authorities declined to accept his jurisdiction.
(An incomplete list of refugees who were housed at the Kitchener camp is included in the website:
https://kitchenercamp.co.uk,
which records the history of the camp.)
*To view a short profile, hold the cursor over his name.
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Other Ramsgate Jewish Institutions & Organisations
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Educational & Theological
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Judith Lady Montefiore's Theological College
established and endowed by Sir Moses Montefiore in 1866. The College moved to London in the 1960s and the
Ramsgate building was demolished. For details of the current activities
of the College, see
its website
https://www.montefioreendowment.org.uk/about/.
Rabbis associated
with the College during its time in Ramsgate include:
Rev. Asher Amschejewitz, who came to the College in 1867 as a scholar in residence.
Rabbi Benjamin Schewzik, who was elected a member of the College.
Haham Rabbi Moses Gaster, principal of the College from 1891 to 1896.
*To view a short profile of one of the above, hold the cursor over his name.
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Hereson House Academy was a Jewish boarding school which advertised in the
Jewish Chronicle from 1868 until the late 1880s.
It was located at Hereson Road, near the turning off to the synagogue.
The school's principals were
Rev. Emanuel Myers,
succeeded by Mr. J. Tritsch.
By 1889 Mr. Tritsch was accepting Jewish boarders at Hereson House who attended
the near by South Eastern College, an Anglican public school (today St Lawrence
College).
Hereson House remained the home of Anne, widow of the Rev. Emanuel Myers, until her death in 1898.
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Townley Castle College was a second Jewish school eastablished at Ramsgate, in 1890, as a "high class" boarding school for young Jewish gentlemen.
The founding principal was
Rev. S. H. Harris,
who on his death in 1907 was succeeded by his son-in-law,
Rev. Samuel Levine.
A photograph of the school indicates it had its own synagogue.(viii)
During World War I, the school moved from Ramsgate to Highbury New
Park, north London. It was later at Putney Heath, London, and for its
final 13 years at Eton Avenue, Hampstead. The school closed in 1940 or
1941, shortly before the death of Rev. Levine.(ix)
Alumni of the school include the following:
Leslie Hoare-Belisha (later 1st Baron Hore-Belisha)
(1893-1957), British politician and Member of Parilament. He initially represented
the Liberal Party, then National Liberal Party and later the
Conservative Party and served as the UK Minister of Transport (1934–1937) and Secretary for War (1937–1940).
Lesley Keysor (1885-1951), who was awarded the Victoria Cross serving with Australian forces at Gallipoli.
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Other Societies
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Hebra Kadisha(x)
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Jewish Literary and Social Society - (until 1930s,
Jewish Literary Society)(xi)
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B'nai B'rith, Thanet (Montefiore) Lodge No 1155 (active
during 1930s)(xii)
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Ramsgate Jewish Cemetery Information
Prior to the establishment of a cemetery in 1872, Sephardi Jewish residents of
Ramsgate were generally buried in the cemeteries in London End Cemeteries
and the Ashkanazi used the cemetery in Canterbury.
The following are the Jewish cemeteries used by the Ramsgate Jewish
community:
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Ramsgate Jewish Cemetery, Upper Dumpton Park Road, Ramsgate
CT11 7PG.
Contains some 400 burials. It was opened in 1872 and extended in 1913
and 1929. The
original plot was was purchased by Benjamin Norden and presented to the local Jewish community
as a burial ground. It has been administered by
the
the Spanish and Portuguese Jews' Congregation (now the S&P Sephardi Community) of London since 1887.
The cemetery's prayer hall and section of attached cemetery wall is a
Grade II Listed Building, listed from
17 March 2008 (number 1392476).
View description
on Historic England website.
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The Reform Hebrew Section of the Margate (St. John's) Cemetery,
Manston Road, Margate, used by the
Thanet and District Reform Jewish Community
since 1986.
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The Montefiore Mausoleum, next to the Montefiore Synagogue, contains the remains of Sir Moses Montefiore and his wife
Lady Judith Montefiore.
(circa 1862). It is a Grade II* Listed Building, listed on 13 August 1968 (number 1085375).
View description on Historic England website
(For some additional information, also
see IAJGS Cemeteries Project - Ramsgate)
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Ramsgate Jewish Population Data
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1897
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60 |
(The Jewish Year Book 1897/8) |
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1900
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100 |
(The Jewish Year Book 1900/1) |
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1901
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130 |
(The Jewish Year Book 1901/2) |
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1947
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70 |
(The Jewish Year Book 1948) |
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1948
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80 |
(The Jewish Year Book 1949) |
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1949
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90 |
(The Jewish Year Book 1950) |
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1950
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100 |
(The Jewish Year Book 1951) |
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1951
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106 |
(The Jewish Year Book 1952) |
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1957
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100 |
(The Jewish Year Book 1958) |
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1959
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165 |
(The Jewish Year Book 1960) |
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1961
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65 |
(The Jewish Year Book 1962) |
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