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Outlook: My mother’s fake name and secret past

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A young Dorothy looks in to the camera in the Foundling Hospital chapel. The other girls are distorted and blurred around her.

29/04/2021 GMT

My mother’s fake name and secret past

BBC World Service - Outlook, My mother’s fake name and secret past

Justine Cowan's English mother invented a fictional childhood

Justine Cowan grew up believing her English mother came from a world of privilege and wealth. After her death, Justine uncovered the truth.

American lawyer Justine Cowan grew up in a wealthy neighbourhood of San Francisco; her childhood was full of privilege, with music lessons and horse riding. It was a lifestyle that seemed fitting for Justine's mother Eileen. She was a highly accomplished English woman who'd always spoken about going to boarding school and studying at London's Royal Academy of Music. But after her death, Justine found out that her mother wasn't who she'd claimed to be.

Justine's written a book about what happened called The Secret Life of Dorothy Soames.  

Get in touch: outlook@bbc.com

Picture: A young Dorothy Soames in May 1941
Credit: Felix Man/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

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