Patrick Comerford
When I was Watford this week, I paid a brief visit to Watford Synagogue, a short ten-minute from Watford Junction station, and also went in search of the sites and locations used by earlier congregations in the town.
There may have been Jews living in Watford in the late 18th century and there has been a continuous Jewish presence since the early 19th century. No formal Jewish congregations were formed in the town until the early 20th century but there were at least four Jewish congregations in the Watford area.
The first Jewish congregation in Watford was formed in 1918 and it continued until the mid-1920s. Several congregations were established during World War II, and the present congregation was established at 38 Clarendon Road at the end of 1946 and it has been in the Nascot Wood area from about 1957.
The Watford and Bushey Hebrew Congregation was active from 1918 until about 1927, with a synagogue on Leavesden Road from 1918. However, this first congregation experienced financial difficulties and, by 1920, it was stated that unless funds were forthcoming, it would be necessary to close the synagogue.
The congregation continued to be listed officially until 1927, but seems to have petered out by then.
During World War II, as families were evacuated from central London, there were at least four short-lived Jewish congregations in the Watford area. They included a congregation organised the Revd E Freedman; a group that was also known as the Watford and Bushey Hebrew Congregation that met in a house in Bushey in 1941-1942, though it does not seem to have had connections with the congregation of the same name in 1918-1927; a congregation that used the Methodist Hall on Queen’s Road in 1941-1945; and the Garston and North Watford Hebrew Congregation, active in 1942-1946.
The first of these short-lived war-time congregations in the Watford area was associated with the Revd E Freedman of Abbots Langley. He appears to have organised Sabbath morning services in the Watford area in in January 1941, but it is not known they related to any of the other congregations in the area at the time.
The Watford and Bushey Hebrew Congregation met in ‘The Gables’ on Heathfield Road in Bushey in 1941-1942. It probably had no connections with the earlier congregation that had the same name in 1918-1927. It first held its services in May 1941, but there is no further mention of it after 1942.
From June 1941, yet another Jewish congregation used the Methodist Hall on Queen’s Road. It later become known as the Watford and District Hebrew Congregation, and its weekly services continued until at least 1945.
Garston and North Watford Hebrew Congregation was holding services from at least 1942, with High Holy Day services in both Saint Peter’s Hall, 58 Tudor Drive, in North Watford, at The Hall at 3 Horseshoe Lane in Garston, as well as in a Methodist hall.
By 1944, the Garston and North Watford Hebrew Congregation was holding its services in Parkgate School, Parkgate Road, Watford. The weekly services continued until late 1946, and the congregation was involved in organising the meeting in December 1946 that led to the formation of the Watford and District Synagogue.
The new congregation brought together the two rival congregations that had emerged in Watford, one meeting in the Methodist Hall on Queen’s Road and the other known as Garston and North Watford Hebrew Congregation.
At first, the synagogue was located at 38 Clarendon Road, Watford, and it has been in the Nascot Wood area since about 1957. The shul is in a house that was once a semi-detached house. It was transformed into a modern synagogue with the building of a large single storey extension following a fire in the early 1990s.
The Revd Mordechai (Martin) Miloslawer served this new congregation from 1947 until about 1950. Before World War II, he was the minister in Koenigsburg in East Prussia, then in Germany and now Kaliningrad in Russia.
His synagogue was destroyed during the Kristallnacht pogroms in November 1938. He was then imprisoned by the Nazis, but came to England in 1939. Later, he served synagogues and congregations in High Wycombe, Wanstead, Woodford, Slough and Windsor, and was a hospital chaplain. He died in 1989.
Watford and District Synagogue joined the United Synagogue as an affiliated synagogue in 1948, and became a constituent or full member synagogue in 1994.
The shul is part of the ‘5+1’ group, consisting of six small United Synagogue communities – five in Hertfordshire and one in Bedfordshire. The 5+1 has an intercommunal social programme that tries to match the programmes offered by large synagogues while retaining the closeness of smaller communities.
Watford and District Synagogue describes itself as ‘a friendly community comprising just under 300 adult members, another 50 young adults and around 50 children.’ It says its services ‘are unashamedly Orthodox’, but that the ‘membership covers the entire spectrum of Jewish observance, and all are welcome.’
The members live in Watford, Bushey, Croxley Green, Rickmansworth, Northwood and surrounding areas of Hertfordshire and North-West London. Rabbi Mordechai Chalk grew up in Golders Green and spent 11 years studying in Israel before moving back to Britain in 2018.
Shabbat Shalom, שבת שלום
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