Robert Clary, 'Hogan's Heroes' star, dead at 96

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Robert Clary, a star of the 1960s sitcom "Hogan's Heroes," died Wednesday at 96.

Clary was a survivor of Nazi concentration camps during World War II. According to The Associated Press, the actor died in his home in Beverly Hills on Wednesday night due to natural causes.

"He never let those horrors defeat him," his niece, Brenda Hancock, said of Clary’s wartime experiences as a youth. "He never let them take the joy out of his life. He tried to spread that joy to others through his singing and his dancing and his painting."

Clary had a special message he used to share with his students. "'Don’t ever hate,'" Hancock said. "He didn’t let hate overcome the beauty in this world."

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Robert Clary, a star of the 1960s sitcom "Hogan Heroes," has died at 96. (Chris Pizzello/Invision)

Clary portrayed Cpl. Louis LeBeau on "Hogan's Heroes," which ran from 1965-71.

Clary was the last surviving original star of the sitcom that included Bob Crane, Richard Dawson, Larry Hovis and Ivan Dixon as his fellow WWII prisoners. Werner Klemperer and John Banner, who played their German captors, both were European Jews who fled Nazi persecution before the war.

Clary began his career as a nightclub singer and appeared on stage in musicals including "Irma La Douce" and "Cabaret." After "Hogan’s Heroes," Clary’s TV work included soap operas "The Young and the Restless," "Days of Our Lives" and "The Bold and the Beautiful."

Robert Clary portrayed Cpl. Louis LeBeau on "Hogan's Heroes." (CBS)

In 2014, Clary said in an interview that he believed musical theater was the highlight of his career. "I loved to go to the theater at quarter of 8, put the stage makeup on and entertain," he said.

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The actor stayed silent about his wartime experience until 1980. A documentary about Clary’s childhood and years of horror at Nazi hands, "Robert Clary, A5714: A Memoir of Liberation," was released in 1985. The forearms of concentration camp prisoners were tattooed with identification numbers, with A5714 to be Clary’s lifelong mark.

"They write books and articles in magazines denying the Holocaust, making a mockery of the 6 million Jews — including a million and a half children — who died in the gas chambers and ovens," he told The Associated Press in a 1985 interview.

Robert Clary died of natural causes in his Beverly Hills home on Wednesday. (Amanda Edwards)

Twelve of his immediate family members — his parents and 10 siblings — were killed under the Nazis, Clary wrote in a biography posted on his website.

"I beg the next generation not to do what people have done for centuries — hate others because of their skin, shape of their eyes, or religious preference," he said in an interview in 1997.

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After he retired from acting, Clary remained in good health and busy with his family, friends and his painting.

Clary married Natalie Cantor, the daughter of singer-actor Eddie Cantor, in 1965. She died in 1997.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.