TODAY IN HISTORY: The Last Diary Entry of Anne Frank (August 1, 1944)

Between July 6, 1942, and August 4, 1944, a teenage Jewish girl named Anne Frank chronicled her life in hiding during one of the darkest periods of history. In Nazi-occupied Netherlands, Anne and her family, along with four others, took refuge in a hidden annex behind her father’s office to avoid deportation to concentration camps. Like many Jews in Europe at the time, they faced the constant threat of discovery by the Nazis, who were systematically rounding up Jewish families.

Within the confined space of the annex, Anne Frank kept a diary, recording her innermost thoughts, the dynamics of her relationships with those around her, and the anxiety of living in constant fear. Her writing paints a vivid picture of life in hiding and provides an intimate look into the human cost of persecution under Nazi rule.

Anne’s final diary entry was written on August 1, 1944, just three days before the annex was raided by the German Security Police, following an anonymous tip. On August 4, 1944, Anne and her family were arrested and later deported to concentration camps. Tragically, Anne Frank died of typhus in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in March 1945, just weeks before the camp was liberated.

Anne Frank’s diary has since been translated into numerous languages and remains one of the most widely read and significant accounts of the Holocaust, shedding light on the human experiences behind one of the greatest atrocities in history.