Eva Schloss, Holocaust survivor and Anne Frank’s stepsister, dies at 96

Eva Schloss, a Holocaust survivor and the stepsister of Anne Frank, passed away at the age of 96, the Anne Frank Trust UK, a Holocaust education foundation she co-founded, announced on Sunday. Schloss spent decades educating people about the Holocaust.

The Anne Frank House said Schloss died on Jan. 3 in London. Born Eva Geiringer in 1929 in Vienna, she was just 11 years old when Nazi Germany annexed Austria. Her Jewish family initially fled to Belgium and later to Amsterdam, where they settled next door to Anne Frank’s family.

Schloss and Frank, who were of a similar age, often played together as children. Frank was murdered in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in 1945. After the Second World War, Otto Frank married Schloss’ mother, Elfriede. Schloss’ father and brother were murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust.

Her family expressed “great sadness” and praised her as a “remarkable woman: an Auschwitz survivor, a devoted Holocaust educator, tireless in her work for remembrance, understanding and peace.”

In 2022, Schloss danced with King Charles III at a special event in London. Queen Camilla, the patron of the Anne Frank Trust UK Foundation, announced that the royals were “greatly saddened” by the news that Schloss had passed away. 

“We are both privileged and proud to have known her and we admired her deeply,” the royal couple said in an official statement.

Otto Frank encouraged his stepdaughter Eva to pursue her interest in photography. In 1952, she moved to London to study and eventually met her future husband, Zvi Schloss. They married a year later and had three daughters. In 2021, then 92-year-old Eva Schloss regained the Austrian citizenship that she had lost during the Nazi takeover in 1938. 

“Into her 90s, she spoke with tireless passion, often giving several talks a day, including in prisons and schools,” said Gillian Walnes, vice president of the Anne Frank Trust UK. 

“Eva’s legacy lives on in the lives she touched and the history she so bravely kept alive,” Walnes concluded. 

In June 2025, amid a surge in global antisemitism following the Hamas Oct. 7 attack in southern Israel, an Anne Frank exhibition in New York decided to give away 10,000 copies of Anne Frank’s famous diary. 

“Anne Frank’s diary is not just a historical document; it is a beacon of hope and a call to action,” explained Ronald Leopold, executive director of the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam, the organizer of the NY exhibition. 

“Her words inspire us to confront injustice and to promote tolerance and human dignity. By distributing thousands of copies of her diary and expanding access to the exhibition, we are reaffirming our commitment to education and remembrance,” Leopold stated.

In February 2025, Anne Frank’s childhood friend, Jacqueline van Maarsen died at the age of 96.