Dorothy Bohm (née Israelit) was born in Königsberg, and in 1932 moved with her family to Memel, where her father was a well-known industrialist. Her father had the opportunity to move his factory to the UK but chose to remain in Memel.

 

In April 1939 the family moved to Lithuania. Dorothy got a visa to go to school in the UK and left Lithuania via Holland in June 1939. She spent one year in a school in Ditchling, Sussex. She then studied photography in Manchester, where she met her husband Louis Bohm, originally from Lodz.

 

After their marriage Dorothy continued to work as a photographer and set up her own studio in the centre of Manchester. When Louis set up his own business she started travelling with him and became an art photographer. Later she set up the ‘Photographer’s Gallery’. Many books were published with her photos and her works were exhibited at the V&A Museum and other places. 

 

The first time that Dorothy met her parents and sister (who was one year when she saw her) after the war in 1960 in Riga. Her father had spent many years in Siberia where he was sent by the Russians for being a ‘Capitalist’. In 1963, with the help of Prime Minister Wilson, her parents were allowed to join her in the UK.