Urmston - Jewish Cemetery

The Jewish cemetery in Urmston is located on Chapel Grove, off Higher Road. It was acquired by the Manchester Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue in 1876 and shared with Polish Jews and Manchester New Synagogue. In 1959, a section was added for Whitefield Synagogue.

In Hebrew, a Jewish cemetery is called bet kevarot (house or place of graves), but more commonly bet hayyim (house or garden of life) or bet olam (house of eternity).

The history of Jewish settlement in Manchester can be traced back to the early 18th century. Initially, the community was small, with only a few dozen families living here, engaged in handicrafts, freight and small trades. It was in the 1780s, when Manchester's Jewish community really began to take shape, as the town began to evolve as a major commercial centre for the production and trade in cotton textiles. A large number of Jewish families who had settled in Liverpool twenty years earlier, came to live in Manchester. The first synagogue in Manchester was established by two brothers, Lemon and Jacob Nathan from Liverpool, who rented the upper chamber of a house in Long Millgate. The earliest burial place was opened on Brindle Heath Road, Pendleton in 1794. Prior to this, Jews who died in Manchester had to be interred in the burial grounds in Liverpool.

Kate Ashcroft, in her article on Jewish History in Manchester, writes:

"By the end of the 18th century, Manchester’s population included a community of Jewish salesmen and shopkeepers who had settled and established businesses across Manchester. Unfortunately, economic opportunity was not the only reason why Jewish migrants made Manchester their home. Throughout the 19th century, Jewish people escaped antisemitic persecution and a lack of opportunity across Europe".

As the Jewish population increased in Manchester, small burial grounds struggled to accommodate the growing number of burials. Private cemeteries were being built for cities with large Jewish populations, and these were usually on the outskirts, where land was more affordable. In 1876, a plot of land in Urmston was purchased from the Jackson family, by the Manchester Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue, with a view to it being used as a cemetery. In March 1877, a consecration service was held at the ground and afterwards, prayers were said for the Queen, the Royal Family and for the Jackson family.

In early 1877, a group of businessmen formed the Manchester Burial Society of Polish Jews Ltd, ( a registered limited company) later named Manchester Jewish Burial Society Ltd. The society offered rights to shareholders, whatever their synagogue allegiance, to interment in the Jewish cemetery at Urmston, a section of which, had been acquired by the society.

On 2 April 1877, the foundation stone for Polish Jews at Urmston was laid with Masonic honours. A bottle containing a copy of the latest Jewish Chronicle and four of the smallest current coins of the realm was laid beneath the foundation stone.

A further consecration service at the cemetery took place in July 1877. An article in the Manchester Times dated 20 July 1877 described the event:

In 1881, plans to extend the Jewish cemetery and build a mortuary chapel for the Manchester Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue were postponed, after Barton Rural Sanitary Authority received a petition, signed by local property owners in Urmston, protesting against the cemetery and chapel, as the site was only a few yards from their homes and businesses. The Manchester Courier dated 17 February 1881, reported that people who lived close, thought it would prove 'prejudicial to health, besides being opposed to all sanitary laws and 'would seriously depreciate the value of property'. The petition was sent to the burial department of the Home Office. In the meantime, the surveyor wrote to the contractors of the cemetery stating that consideration of the plans had been postponed. On 13 April 1881, at a meeting held by Barton Rural Sanitary Authority, it was reported that the Local Government Board had 'declined to interfere with the extension of the Jewish cemetery'. By 1890, two mortuary chapels had been built at the cemetery, for the Manchester Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue and for Polish Jews.

In 1893, plans for a new mortuary chapel and new cemetery for the Manchester New Synagogue, (that would adjoin the Spanish and Portuguese burial ground), were approved, together with plans for a new street, off Higher Road, Urmston, which would later be named Albert Avenue. The architects were Messrs. Ogden and Charleton of Spring Gardens, Manchester.

William Sharp Ogden and Edward Waring Charleton were also the architects of the Talmud Torah School for Hebrew Education of Jewish Children in Cheetham, Manchester, in 1894.

William Sharp Ogden was born in 1844 in Bolton. He married Emma Vaison in 1873 & they lived for a long time in Rusholme. William's other work includes the red brick Synagogue on Cheetham Hill Road, Manchester in 1894, as well as several monuments at Urmston Jewish cemetery and Southern cemetery. William also wrote many books on a range of subjects including mercantile architecture. His partnership with Edward Waring Charleton was formed in 1891 & dissolved in 1894. In 1899, William formed a partnership with John Rennison Little, which lasted until 1902. William died in London in 1926. 

Edward Waring Charleton was born in 1842 in Gloucester. Over the years he lived in Hulme, Ashton on Mersey and Sale. Edward died in 1921 and is buried at St Martin's Church, Ashton on Mersey.

The Manchester Evening News dated 8 May 1894, reported that a large deputation of members of the Manchester New Synagogue, York Street, Cheetham, had proceeded to Urmston on 5 May, to assist in the laying of memorial stones at the new cemetery and the mortuary that was being constructed for that section of the Jewish community. The memorial stones were inscribed in English and Hebrew and laid by officers of the synagogue, to whom silver trowels were presented. 

War Memorial

The cemetery has one of the very few free standing First World War memorials commemorating Jewish personnel in the UK. The war memorial commemorates twenty two local servicemen from the Jewish community who died in the First World War, including the sons of the memorial’s designer, Abraham Lesser Carliph and donor, John Levi.

The memorial was unveiled in the cemetery in September 1919, at Rosh Hashanah ( Jewish New Year). After the Second World War, another panel commemorating a further six Jewish servicemen, was added. The memorial was re-dedicated in June 2004 and marble plaques replicating the First World War inscriptions were fixed over the original text on the obelisk. The memorial is in the classical style with inscriptions in Hebrew and English. It is Grade II listed. 

The mortuary chapel built in 1894 at the end of Albert Avenue, was demolished some time after 2007 ( date unknown).

Sadly, the Jewish cemetery in Urmston, has been the target of vandalism over the years; the most recent attacks took place on three occasions in 2018, when around 30 headstones were pushed over and smashed, causing substantial financial and emotional cost.  

The cemetery is managed by the North Manchester Jewish Cemeteries Trust (NMJCT) 

For further information on where to find burial records for Urmston Jewish cemetery, contact Trafford Local Studies:

Telephone: 0161 912 3013                    Email: trafflocals@trafford.gov.uk.

Further research

You can find more building plans and archival records using the Trafford Local Studies catalogue

Sources

Trafford Local Studies collection, cat. ref. PLA/2/1893/2/395

Edinburgh Evening News, 17 March 1877

Manchester Courier, 17  February 1881

Manchester Times, 20 July 1877

The Runcorn Guardian, 4 April 1877

Manchester Evening News, 8 May 1894

Trafford Lifetimes

Ashcroft, Kate, Jewish History in Manchester https://manchesterhistorian.com

Meng, Xinran, The epitome of a diverse community:Manchester Jewish Museum https://www.manchesterhistories.com

Williams, Bill, Jewish Manchester: an illustrated history

The Manchester Great and New Synagogue website - Congregation history

Historic England: war memorial & obelisk in Urmston Jewish cemetery https://historicengland.co.uk

Trafford Local Studies collection, cat. ref. 293. Pamphlet on The story of Manchester's Jewish Community, notes from Bill William's talk given to Bowdon History Society, 1987.

Trafford War Dead website

Architects of Greater Manchester 1800-1940. https://manchestervictorianarchitects.org.uk

www.jewsfww.uk/urmston-jewish-cemetery-memorial-manchester-4252.php