the former

Barnstaple Jewish Community

& Synagogue

Barnstaple, North Devon, Devon

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congregations throughout the British Isles and Gibraltar, both past and present.

Town of Barnstaple

Barnstaple is the main town in north Devon in southeast England, located on the river Taw flowing into the Bristol Channel. It has a population of about 53,000 (including satellite communities). Barnstaple had claimed borough status since Saxon times. In 1974, the then Municipal Borough of Barnstaple was merged with a number of neighbouring localities to form the District of North Devon, a local government district of the county of Devon.

Barnstable Jewish Community

There is evidence of some Jewish families in Barnstaple from at least 1765,⁽ⁱⁱⁱ⁾ although very little is known of synagogue or organised Jewish community, which appears to have ceased to exist by the mid eighteenth century.

Congregation Data
Name:	Barnstaple Synagogue
Address:	At the home of Mr. Abraham Ralph.
Formation and Closure:	The congregation was formed prior to 1805 and would not have continued beyond the mid 19th century.^(iv)
Ritual:	Ashkenazi Orthodox
Press Report:	The existence of an organised Jewish congregation in Barnstaple is currently based solely on the following press report:^(v) The Gentleman's Magazine, vol. LXXV, Pt2, 1805, p 1176 "Mr. Abraham Ralph, silversmith of Barnstaple, Devon, where he was the oldest shopkeeper and had been in business upwards of 40 years. The Synagogue assemblies were always held in his house."
Registration District:	Devon, since 1 April 2007^(vi) - Link to Register Office website
Cemetery Information:	There is no known Jewish Cemetery in North Devon.

Online Articles relating to the Barnstable Jewish Community

on JCR-UK

Barnstable Bibliography.

on Third Party Websites

The Jews of Barnstable and Bideford by Helen Fry on the JSTOR website.

Some Notable Jewish Connections with Barnstable

Sir Menasseh Lopes MP (1755-1831), a Jewish convert to Christianity, was MP for Barnstaple (1812-1819) in addition to representing other boroughs in the west of England. In 1819 he was alleged to have spent £3,000 on bribing the voters of Barnstaple and his election was declared void. Descendants of Jewish plantation owners in Jamaica, the Lopes family were extensive landowners in Devon and Wiltshire. The main family residence was at Maristow House, near Plymouth.
Maurice Prince (1899-1991), entrepreneur, developed and owned cinemas in Barnstaple and Bideford. During World War II he provided temporary safe-houses for Jewish refugees and located homes for these refugees locally. An archive collection of Maurice Prince's papers is held at the North Devon Record Office.^(x)
During World War II, 80 to 90 Jewish youngsters trained in agriculture at Bydown House, a partially derelict Georgian residence located near Swimbridge, approximately five miles inland from Barnstaple. The training was in preparation for kibbutz life in what became the state of Israel.^(xi)

Notes & Sources
(↵ returns to text above)

(i) and (ii) Reserved.
(iii) Thesis - The Jews of South-East England by Bernard Susser ("the Thesis" online), 1977, Chapter Two, Part 2, which gives the first known date of Jewish residence as 1765. ↵
(iv) The Thesis, which also gives the last known date of Jewish residence in Barnstable as 1844. ↵
(v) "The Jews of Barnstaple" by Helen Fry, published by The Hidden Legacy Foundation as part of The Jews of Devon and Cornwall, 2000, pp. 61-63. ↵
(vi) Previous Registration Districts: Barnstable - from 1 July 1837 to 1 April 1998; and North Devon - from 1 April 1998 to 1 April 2007; All registers would now be held by the current office. ↵
(vii) to (ix) Reserved.
(x) The Jewish Chronicle of 11 April 2003. ↵
(x) The Jewish Chronicle of 23 December 2005. ↵

Jewish Communities in Devon

Jewish Communities of England homepage

Page created: 21 June 2016
Page materially enhanced and notes added: 16 November 2023
Page most recently amended: 26 December 2023

Research and formatting by David Shulman, assisted by Steven Jaffe

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