In 1955, my name was Johann Gaisbauer and I left Austria because of dissatisfaction with employment prospects there and an eagerness for adventure elsewhere in the world.

I was the youngest, (18 yrs. old) in a group of 7 young men who had all grown up…

John Gaibor, Austria, 1955

Tom and Nanny Wardle

Having lived through the German occupation in the Netherlands and living in war-torn Liverpool with my British husband Tom, we decided to find a better lifestyle in South Africa. Although we had quite a carefree time in Capetown…

Nanny and Tom Wardle, UK, 1960

Susan Haris was born Feher Zursanna on 22nd January 1923 in Budapest, Hungary. She belonged to a loving middle class Jewish family and her memories are of an idyllic childhood up till her 17th year. This ended with the news of Jewish people soon to be…

Susan Haris, Hungary, 1949

I came straight after the 2nd world war, from a small villiage in Benastare, Reggio Calabria coming from a large family of 11 children being the 5th child and only 16 years old. The decision was made by my father and myself that we would have to make our…

Domenico Garreffa, Italy, 1949

James Arnot 26/01/1913 – 23/04/2008 born in Coatbridge, Scotland.

He was one of 10 children, his mother married twice, so he was brought up by his grandparents who were miners strugglng to make ends meet. Jim was a good student who already in…

James Arnot, Scotland, 1948

With my parents, Emilio Fioravanti and Giuseppina Censori, we left San Benedetto Del Tronto as assisted migrants, sponsored by my uncle Adamo Fioravanti, to start a new and better life in Sydney. The only cost to my parents was $30 for the flight on…

Tony Fioravanti, Australia, 1968

After the death of their baby daughter Charles wanted to give his young family (wife Caroline & baby son Julian) a better life. Great grandfather accepted the opportunity for assisted passage as a carpenter in the relatively young settlement…

Charles Henry DeBrenni, England, 1878

We left Malaysia for a better future for our children. There is no place or prospect for us non Bumiprutra.

Four of us, my wife Julie, sons Endy and Danny flew by Quantas from Singapore to Sydney. It was a normal flight. We got to Kingford Smith Airport…

Tony Cheng Beh, Malaysia, 6/3/1977

Averse to being conscripted into the Gernman army, great Grandfather Friedrich and his two brothers decided to emigrate. After all, the family would have grown up with tales of the Napoleonic Wars and the horrors of the French Revolution. My Dad …

FRIEDRICH Winter, GERMANY, 1855

I left England to start a nursing career and came to do that in Australia as my foster brother George Edland had settled here 2 years earlier.

I had a wonderful trip on the Orcades from Tibury to Fremantle. It included a Mediterranean cruise and we stopped…

Connie Sullivan, England, 1963

Bruno was born in February 1948 in One` Di Fonte, a town in the province of Treviso Veneto in Italy. He is the youngest son of Florindo and Luigia, brother to Giorgio and Fedele Reginato. When Bruno was at the age of seventeen he boarded the ship Marconi.…

Bruno Reginato, Italy, 1965

The Watson family, father Leslie Herbert Watson, mother Hilda Grace Watson, and children Jacqueline Grace Watson, Dennis Leslie Watson, Teresa Grace Watson and Joseph Leslie Watson left Thatcham, Berkshire in England to start a new life with …

Dennis Watson, England, 1970

Morgan Lee was born in Moycullen near Galway Ireland, a descendant of Gaelic nobility (his family had for many generations been hereditary physicians to the fearsome O’Flaherty clan of West Connaught). He farmed on the remote Irish-speaking…

Morgan Lee, Ireland, 1851

At the end of WWII I was a displaced person in a camp in Villach, Austria. Returning to Slovenia for me was not an option due to the political situation there. An English Army Co. of Engineers needed people to work in their mess and I volunteered to do so.…

Anton AMBROZ, Slovenia, 6/6/1949

After the end of WWII, where I lived in SOCA, the living was very poor; no work and a political regime;no freedom, very little food. I decided to try my luck, crossing the border into Italy. I succeeded and was placed in Freschette refugee camp. I waited…

Josef ZORC, Slovenia, 1956

My father, Terrence Milner Bennett, together with my mum, Caroline Margaret Bennett left England with my sister and I in 1971 in search of a better life, with more opportunities. My father was full of adventure and wanted to leave England to start …

Terrence Milner Bennett, England, 1971

In December 1987, my family consisting of my father (Zainul), mother (Jacinta), brother (Gerard) and myself made the decision to leave our homeland of Singapore to migrate to Australia for a chance at a better life. I was 5 years old at the time and …

Chris Abideen, Singapore, 1987

Moise and Charlotte Srulevici

My parents were born in the area of Russia known as Bessarabia: my father, Moishe (1906) the son of the Rezina dentist, my mother Sarlota (1907), daughter of a draper in the Black Sea port Odessa. The Russian Revolution…

Moise & Charlotte Srulevici, Bessarabia, Russia, 1939

J. CHRISTIAN PFEIFFER

Early Family Life

Johan Christian Pfeiffer (known as Christian) was born on October 18 1812 the 2nd child of his parents Johan Georg and Christiane. The father\’s first name was also used for his other sons. The family…

J. CHRISTIAN PFEIFFER, GERMANY, 1838

This story is about my father whom was born in Gaiarine Italy. It was after the war and this region had little prospect for the future, my father was a fashion designer and had shown ability and passion from a very young age as he used to make all his clothes…

Flavio Panizzutti, Italy, 1952

The thought of a warm envirnment was the main reason my young family, husband and I departed for Australia. As we came from the North of England with its dark satanic mills we were looking for a view of the sky that was not possible at home. We had a good …

Kathleen Farley, England, 1972

Edmond was born in Cornwall, England and probably followed his father into the mines. He married Honor Williams there when he was 25 and she was 18. They had seven children, all of whom except one daughter died in childbirth or very young.

They emigrated…

Edmond Simons, England, c1854

STANISLAW BACIA VM, Croix De Guerre

HILDA BACIA nee Baird

My father, Stanislaw Adam Bacia, was born on November 2, 1914 in Bobrowniki in the industrial belt of Southern Poland. Graduating as a teacher, he was also a reserve officer attached to the …

Stanislaw Bacia VM, Poland, 1952

I believe my parents, Nellie and Eric Whitehall’s reason for leaving England at the time was because my father was working so hard at a factory, getting sick so often and after the war they seemed to never quite get ahead with 4 children. My mother…

Eric Whitehall, England, 1954

Frank Ciancio left Italy to settle in Australia with his new wife Marianna. Australia at that period in time was being marketed as the land of opportunity, so Frank left for the new country leaving behind the poverty that he was accustomed to in Italy.…

Frank Ciancio, Italy, 1965

My paternal grandfather, Alexander Bishop, arrived in the Chinde, British Concession at the mouth of the Zambezi in 1896. Chinde had a flotilla company that transported supplies to land-locked Nyasaland. My grandparents had 10 children and all…

Heather Dwyer, Nyasaland, 1963

In 1986 when the Chernobyl disaster happened we (my wife Angelika, two children Ben (6) and Charlotte (3) and me) decided to leave Germany. The fallout was so bad and we where really worried about the future since Europe was/is full of nuclear powerstations.…

Siegfried (Ziggy) Pyka, Germany, 1987