A birth registration was found for Name: Michael R Elliman; Mother's Maiden Surname: Dewse; Date of Registration: Jul Aug Sep 1951; Registration district: Cleveland; Registration county: Yorkshire - North Riding; Volume Number: 1b; Page Number: 778.

In 1959, Michael Elliman, 11 (along with his brother, Christopher Elliman, 9) arrived at Sydney, Australia, with a small group of children from 38, Holland Villas Road, London, England, en route to Fairbridge Farm School, Molong, Australia.

Michael's name was changed to Michael Linden. He grew up in Elsternwick, Australia. He now resides in Melbourne, Australia.

Michael has written verse since his early teens but has rarely published, preferring to privilege the spoken over the printed word.

He studied at Melbourne University, obtaining degrees in English Language and Literature, and Linguistics. He now makes a living as a wholesale vegan baker punctuated with occasional forays into inner-city spoken word venues to keep in touch with his soul. Michael wrote a poem about his life and experiences on his website in 2006 (copyright Michael Linden):

By the time I was ten years old r nthe memory of my mother r nhad been almost obliterated.
Apart from the indisputable fact r nthat both my brother and myself r nwalked upon this world r nand therefore must once have been born r nit was if the woman who had given us life r nhad never existed.

My father ran his own Ministry of Propaganda: r nany reference to our mother was expunged r nfrom our past and present lives.
No photographs or documents existed r nwhich might serve to remind us r nthat once we had enjoyed r nthe comfort of a mother's love.
And implicitly we knew r nthat we must not mention her r nin any way.

At the end of 1959, my brother and I r nembarked from the port of Tilbury in Kent r nto sail for Australia aboard the SS Strathaird r nof the Peninsular and Oriental Line.

Within the space of less than two years r nour feeling of family had been whittled away r nuntil finally we had become child migrants: r nostensibly orphans under the temporary r ncare and protection of the Fairbridge Society.

Just before Christmas the small group r nof children with whom we were travelling r narrived in Melbourne and were then r ntransported overland to the Fairbridge Farm School r nnear Molong in New South Wales.

We only spent six months there r nbut for two young boys aged ten and eight r nit might as well have been six years.

Decades later when the tragedy of child migration r nhad been rightly exposed for the abuse that it was
I was informed by a social worker assigned to r nthe task of counselling former child migrants r nthat my my brother's and my own case r ndid not qualify for assistance because unlike r nothers less fortunate we had only spent r na short period of time in the hell that was Fairbridge.

I wanted to tell her that after the first month of r nsystematic neglect, exploitation and endemic bullying r nit no longer mattered how long it persisted r nfor by then the damage was already done r nafter which it became merely a matter of endurance r nand the counting off of the months and years remaining r nbefore the long-term inmates could legally claim the right to leave.

And I also wanted to tell her that although
I wasn't quite certain what damage the experience r nhad wrought on me, I knew that within two years r nof our departure from that wretched place r nmy brother began exhibiting the first symptoms r nof the mental illness that would see him r nspend the rest of his life in institutions suffering r nthe ravages of ECT and chronic medication.

I am sure they would all say they were only doing r ntheir job: the well-remunerated professionals, r nthe middle-class men and women who counselled my father r nthat he was doing right by us in giving us a better life r nthan we could ever hope to