Description
Join us on Sunday, November 23, 2025 for a walking tour through Hebrew Rest Cemeteries No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3. Starting with Hebrew Rest No. 1, established in 1860, we’ll walk chronologically through New Orleans’s Jewish history, making a second stop at Hebrew Rest No. 2 (established in 1894), and finally wrapping up at Hebrew Rest No. 3 (established in 1938). Along the way, we’ll pass by the final resting places of thousands of significant Jewish New Orleanians, discussing the lives of 18th century immigrants who founded New Orleans’s first Jewish congregations and following their families’ stories to the descendants of their great-grandchildren. At Hebrew Rest No.1, we’ll visit a monument to the 271 persons who were originally interred in Gates of Mercy Cemetery (1828-1957); we’ll examine the raised copings of 30 children who passed away while residents of the Jewish Home for Widows and Orphans (1855-1946); we’ll look at the large section of unmarked grave sites where hundreds were interred during the devastating 1867 Yellow Fever Epidemic; and we’ll gaze upon hundreds of elaborate markers erected to memorialize mid-19th century immigrants from Alsace, Lorraine, and Bavaria. Throughout the three cemeteries, we’ll pay tribute to past Rabbis and Holocaust survivors, and we’ll observe the ongoing evolution of Jewish burial artifacts, such as raised copings, headstones, an urn garden, and a mausoleum.
