Bytow Jewish Cemetery

In the situational sketch for the city development plan from 1904, the Jewish burial place is located at the former Lazarethstrasse, today’s Hieronima Derdowskiego Street. This plot is not separated on the plan, so it is not possible to clearly state the exact area it covered. However, it is clearly marked on an orientation sketch published in 1988 in the “Pommersche Zeitung” – the newspaper of the Pomeranian Association.
The cemetery was severely desecrated twice. Firstly, by the Nazis during WWII. Most likely, all the matzevot were taken away at that time. The city authorities liquidated the site in the late 1960s and early 1970s. At that time, the cemetery was officially destroyed in accordance with the then law.
The issue of the local Jewish cemetery returned at the beginning of the 21st century, when the Economic School Complex made plans to build a new gym.
From 1849, a Chevra Kadisha operated in the city. In 1926 the organization had about 40 members.
No further information on the history of the cemetery is available. On November 30, 1967, the Presidium of the City National Council in Bytów adopted a resolution to close it. The cemetery was transformed into a park, and a school was built on parts of the site. The old trees remained from the ground layer of the cemetery. The cemetery is not entered in the municipal and provincial register of monuments and the register of immovable monuments.

In 2011, during work on Bernarda Wery Street, destroyed matzevot were found, which were secured in the West-Kashubian Museum in Bytów. Fragments of the tombstones were used to build a monument at the site of the demolished synagogue. The monument was unveiled in 2013 on the initiative of the Committee for Commemorating the Jewish Community in Bytów.