Eva Schloss, the stepsister of Anne Frank and a survivor of Auschwitz who dedicated decades to Holocaust education, passed away on Saturday in London at the age of 96.
The Anne Frank Trust UK, the educational nonprofit she co‑founded, announced her death.
King Charles on Sunday issued a statement in which he paid tribute to Schloss.
“My wife and I are greatly saddened to hear of the death of Eva Schloss. The horrors that she endured as a young woman are impossible to comprehend and yet she devoted the rest of her life to overcoming hatred and prejudice, promoting kindness, courage, understanding and resilience through her tireless work for the Anne Frank Trust U.K. and for Holocaust education across the world," the King said.
“We are both privileged and proud to have known her and we admired her deeply. May her memory be a blessing to us all," he added.
Born Eva Geiringer in Vienna in May 1929, she and her family fled Austria after the Nazi annexation. They later settled in Amsterdam, living on Merwedeplein directly opposite the Frank family.
Like Anne Frank, Eva was forced into hiding as Nazi persecution intensified. The Geiringer family went underground in July 1942 and remained hidden for nearly two years before being betrayed and arrested in May 1944.
Eva and her mother, Elfriede “Fritzi" Geiringer, were deported to Auschwitz‑Birkenau, where they endured months of imprisonment. Her father, Erich Geiringer, and her brother, Heinz, were separated upon arrival and later transferred to camps in Austria, where both died. Eva and her mother - emaciated, ill, and close to death - survived until the camp’s liberation by Soviet forces in January 1945.
After the war, Eva returned to Amsterdam with her mother. In 1953, her mother married Otto Frank, the only member of his immediate family to survive the camps, making Eva Anne Frank’s posthumous stepsister.
Eva later moved to London to study photography, where she met her husband, Zvi Schloss, a German Jew who had fled Nazi persecution. For many years she spoke little about her wartime experiences, but in the late 1980s she became one of the UK’s most prominent Holocaust educators. She co‑founded the Anne Frank Trust UK and devoted herself to speaking to young people about the dangers of racism and hatred. She travelled widely, visiting schools and universities to urge future generations to combat prejudice.
Her work was formally recognized when she was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE).
In 2020, Schloss was one of a group of Holocaust survivors from around the world who provided their support to a campaign targeting Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, urging him to take action to remove Holocaust denial from the social media site.
The year before, she met privately with a group of California teens who were photographed giving the Nazi salute while standing next to a swastika made of red cups.
In 2021, she regained Austrian citizenship and received the Medal for Services to the Republic of Austria.
Her husband died in 2016. Eva Schloss is survived by her daughters and grandchildren.