Nottingham occupies an important strategic site on the sandstone cliffs which command an ancient crossing point of the River Trent to the south of the town, the site of the present Trent Bridge. There was no apparent Roman occupation but some pre-C9 history is indicated by its Saxon name – Snotingeham, homestead of the Snots. Nottingham was one of the five boroughs of the Danelaw but in 921 it was recovered by the Saxons. The medieval walled town consisted of the French settlement to the west dominated by the royal castle built by William Peveral for William the Conqueror, and the Anglo-Danish settlement to the east dominated by St Mary’s Church with the largest market place in England linking them together. The Trent fostered trade and Nottingham prospered in industry and commerce, chiefly wool-dyeing and cloth-making. The medieval town, according to Leland, ‘was both a large town and welle builded for tymber and plaister’ with thatched roofs.
After the Civil War, two fashionable quarters grew up, one round St Mary’s Church, the other round the rebuilt castle, and by the end of the C17, Nottingham was transformed into an elegant town filled with fine brick townhouses, some with generous gardens. A series of visitors left glowing records of the new town created by this rebuilding. Celia Fiennes in 1694 called it ‘the neatest town I have ever seen’, and Daniel Defoe, thirty years later, said it was ‘one of the most pleasant and beautiful towns in England’. Transformation into an industrial city began in the C18 with the commercial success of the domestic framework-knitting industry, salt-glazed stoneware and brick-making at Mapperley. The population nearly doubled from 28,000 in 1801 to 50,000 in 1830, and the gardens, orchards and other green spaces were gradually built over replacing the once green and pleasant town with a congested industrial one. This was largely caused by the corporation townsmen who were not willing to relinquish common land around the town for development. It was only after the reform of the town council in the 1830s and the eventual passing of a series of Enclosure Acts in the 1840s that land around the town was released to allow for the Victorian expansion to begin in earnest.
After the exodus of large numbers of people to the new suburbs, the lace trade took over the streets round St Mary’s church for its warehouses, and the area became known as the Lace Market. The 1870s saw a spate of public works, such as Trent Bridge (1871), the first Board School (1874), the first industrial dwellings (1876-1877), and University College (1877-1881); and in 1877 the borough was extended to include Sneinton, Basford, Bulwell, Radford, and Lenton. Nottingham became a city in 1897 but its population increased most significantly when more of the surrounding villages were incorporated in the 1930s and 1950s. Nottingham suffered little war damage but in 1942 a Reconstruction Committee was appointed to plan post-war development. There were major slum clearances and an inner ring road was constructed which disrupted the old town’s plan.
Nottingham was also the home of a Jewish community in the middle ages. Following the expulsion of the Jews from England by Edward l in the C13, there was no established Jewish community in Nottingham until at least the late C18. Although Jewish ‘Resettlement’ commenced in 1650, it was not until the late C18 that the communities began to significantly expand, often in the growing urban areas of London, Birmingham, Leeds and Manchester. The Jewish community also became more established in Nottingham in the early C19 century and is said to have been founded by David Solomon, a Russian Jew who settled in the city in 1820. The Nottingham Hebrew Congregation was founded in 1823 as a mainstream orthodox Ashkenazi congregation affiliated to the United Synagogue. It was always an initial priority for a community to acquire a burial ground, even before a synagogue was built, since worship could take place in private houses and rented rooms. This was the case in Nottingham up until 1890 when the first purpose-built synagogue was opened. Hence Jewish burial groundsare often the earliest indicator of the presence a Jewish community in a town. The earliest ‘provincial’ Jewish Cemetery was established in 1749 in Portsmouth, further ones were created in Penzance and Falmouth in the later C18. Jewish cemeteries were also established in other towns in the south of England in the early years of the C19, such as Bath in 1812 and Cheltenham in 1824.
In 1822, David Solomon’s name features on an application made to the town corporation for a piece of ground to be used as a Jewish cemetery. Minutes of the Common Council of a meeting on Wednesday 23 October 1822, note that ‘The Committee appointed at the last Hall to treat with persons of the Jewish Religion resident in Nottingham for the Sale or Lease of a piece of Waste Ground to be used by them as a Burial Ground Report That they have agreed to lease to them doe the above purpose one hundred and forty four yards of the Waste Land adjoining Mansfield Road at one penny per yard annum for nine hundred and ninety nine years.’
On the 26th February 1823, in a special ceremony, the first stone of the boundary wall was laid by the Mayor, Mr Oldknow. It was reportedly an impressive occasion, with Rabbi Moses Levi in his sacerdotal robes leading a procession around the cemetery ground. They recited psalms and prayers for the Royal family, the mayor and corporation, the burgesses and the descendants of Israel. After the opening, the cemetery was walled round and a small building was erected at a cost of £100 for the purpose of prayers and ceremonies prior to the internment.
The Jewish community in Nottingham was not prosperous which is indicated by the marriage registers of the period and, as a further example, the relatively low wages of the officiants. But it grew steadily during the mid-19th century and constituted itself formally as a Congregation in 1845. In the 1830s and 1840s a number of merchants and hosiery and textile manufacturers came from Germany. One of the headstones in the cemetery, with an extensive inscription in both Hebrew and English is of Simon Dreschfeld from Bavaria. Some stayed to become prominent members and benefactors of the Jewish and general community. By 1853 Jews in Nottingham were engaged in a number of trades and included watchmakers, tailors, jewellers, pawnbrokers and lace manufacturers. By the mid-C19 the community was becoming more prominent and the old burial ground was becoming too small for its needs. A member of the community, Jacob Weinburg, bought a plot of land on the corner of Hardy Street and Southey Street for use as a new burial ground and sold it to the congregation for five shillings. An appeal was made in the Jewish Chronicle for financial assistance to build a wall around the new plot. In 1869, the same year they received a visit from the Chief Rabbi, the old burial ground in North Sherwood Street closed and the new burial ground opened.