1938: Destruction of the synagogue on the Michelsberg
On the night of November 9-10, 1938, the Wiesbaden SA also received the order to destroy the synagogues. The synagogue on Michelsberg was set on fire for the first time at around 4 o'clock in the morning.
After the fire department had extinguished the fire, the place of worship was ravaged by fire again a few hours later. The synagogues in Friedrichstraße, Schierstein, Bierstadt and Biebrich also fell victim to the nationwide pogrom, as did a number of other places of worship.
Throughout Germany, many Jewish citizens were mistreated, many were murdered and many of their businesses and homes were destroyed.
In total, around 30,000 Jewish business and private individuals were arrested and deported to concentration camps, many of them from Wiesbaden, in order to extort a total of one billion Reichsmark from them as "atonement", also to "Aryanize" their businesses or force them to flee abroad. The subsequent forced elimination of German Jews from social and economic life was the immediate prelude to the mass murder of the Jewish people.
