Metadata: Jewish Memorial Council
Collection
- Country:
- United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
- Holding institution:
- London Metropolitan Archives, City of London
- Holding institution (official language):
- London Metropolitan Archives, City of London
- Postal address:
- 40 Northampton Road, London EC1R 0HB, United Kingdom
- Phone number:
- (+44) 20 7332 3820
- Email:
- ask.lma@cityoflondon.gov.uk
- Reference number:
- ACC/2999
- Title:
- Jewish Memorial Council
- Title (official language):
- Jewish Memorial Council
- Creator/accumulator:
- Jewish Memorial Council
- Date(s):
- 1899/2001
- Language:
- English
- Extent:
- 11.87 linear metres
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Photographic images
- Audio
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
- Records of the Jewish Memorial Council, 1899-2001. The archive mainly consists of files and working papers on administrative and financial subjects. It also includes papers of its Public Schools Committee, Jewish Committee for HM Forces and the Central Council for Jewish Religious Education. Included are papers relating to outside organisations such as the Jewish Book Council, Union of Jewish Women, Forum for Jewish Dialogue and the Jewish Youth Fund. The records of the Reverend Malcolm Weisman are noteworthy for the detail they provide on the survival of Judaism in small, often isolated, communities.
- Archival history:
- Deposited at London Metropolitan Archives in multiple accessions between 1992 and 2001.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- The Jewish Memorial Council was founded in 1919 on the initiative of Sir Robert Waley Cohen, F.C. Stern, Lord Swaythling, and Major Lionel de Rothschild. A public meeting was held in Central Hall, Westminster on 11 June 1919 to approve and undertake a scheme to raise a fund to establish a permanent war memorial to the Jews of the British Empire who had served in the 1914-1918 war. The fund's main objectives were the endowment of Jewish religious education and the making of further provision for the Jewish ministry. The Jewish Memorial War Council (renamed Jewish Memorial Council in 1931) was able to promote Jewish religious education and welfare with a great variety of activities. Hebrew classes throughout the country were inspected and encouraged. The Council administered the Synagogue Provident and Pensions Fund, which was a superannuation fund for all congregational officials in the British Commonwealth. In 1923 the Union of Jewish Women presented the Mrs Nathaniel Louis Cohen Library to the Council, thus establishing its library. In co-operation with Jews' College and the United Synagogue the Council decided to build a Jewish Communal Centre, Woburn House, which opened in 1932. As well as providing accommodation for Jews' College and office space for all three organisations, it contained two halls for meetings, and the Jewish Museum established in 1932 by Wilfred Samuel and Dr Cecil Roth under the auspices of the Council. The Council awarded grants and scholarships out of its own resources as well as administering other scholarship funds. These included the Alfred Louis Cohen Scholarship established in 1904 to assist students preparing for the Jewish Ministry, and the Sir Robert Waley Cohen Memorial Scholarship. Waley Cohen served as Chairman of the Executive Committee from 1919 to 1947 and President of the Council from 1947 until his death in 1952. In his memory his family and friends raised £10,000 to establish the Sir Robert Waley Cohen Memorial Scholarship to provide Jewish ministers from the British Commonwealth with travelling scholarships to pursue Jewish studies. After the Second World War the problem of small Jewish communities with insufficient resources to maintain a minister or provide religious education for their children aroused growing concern. In 1948 the Council agreed to set up a Small Communities Committee to give grants to these communities, to visit them and report on their needs. In 1962 the Reverend Malcolm Weisman was appointed visiting minister to small communities whose number continued to increase with the dispersal of the Jewish population from large urban centres to rural areas. In 1978-79 the Council suffered a financial crisis, necessitating a reduction in the scale of its activities including the transfer of its library to Jews' College, a reduction in the reward of grants and scholarships and the closure of the bookshop. However many aspects of its work continued to flourish, including the Pensions Fund, Reverend Weisman's assistance to small communities, religious education for Jewish boarders at public schools, and the inspection and advice given to provincial Hebrew classes. This last responsibility was handed over from the Central Council for Jewish Religious Education in 1976.
- Access points: locations:
- London
- United Kingdom
- Access points: persons/families:
- Waley Cohen, Robert
- Weisman, Malcolm
- System of arrangement:
- Catalogued in eight sections: Administration; Finance; Public Schools Committee; Central Council for Jewish Religious Education; Jewish Committee for HM Forces; Reverend Malcolm Weisman; Outside organisations; Audio visual
- Access, restrictions:
- These records are open to public inspection, although records containing personal information may be subject to closure periods.
- Finding aids:
- Please see online catalogues.
- Links to finding aids:
- https://search.lma.gov.uk/opac_lma/index.htm
- Yerusha Network member:
- London Metropolitan Archives
- Author of the description:
- Nicola Avery, London Metropolitan Archives, 2018
