Michael Machin was born on 26 July 1890 in Amsterdam as the son of Hirch Machin (21 May 1859) from Minsk in Russia and Susanna Löwenstein (27 February 1863) from Enschede.
Michael was the third of six children in the Hirch Machin family; his sisters and brothers were Betsij (1886), Salomon (1887), Mozes (1892), Marianne (1894) and Isidoor Jacob (1897). The youngest left for America in 1921. Until the end of 1930, the Hirch Machin family lived at about nine different addresses in the old centre area of Amsterdam, around the Nieuwe Doelenstraat, Amstel and Keizersgracht.
Michael, who had become a shoemaker by profession, left his parental home in 1917, when he married Rozette van Praag, a daughter of Zacharias van Praag and Hanna van Emden, on 15 February of that year. Rozette was born on 11 March 1894 in Amsterdam.
However, only one daughter was born from that wedlock: Susanna, on 13 July 1918. The marriage did not last and on 12 June 1928 the marriage was dissolved by divorce. Rozette did not remarry until 1941, to the widower of Elisabeth Rokkestikker, Hijman Oudkerk. Daughter Susanna Machin survived the Holoacaust but her mother Rozette van Praag and her 2nd husband Hijman Oudkerk were murdered in Auschwitz on 22 May 1944.
Michael Machin remarried on 14 February 1929 to the non-Jewish Anna Elisabeth van der Meer, who was born on 6 February 1896 in Amsterdam as a daughter of Egbert van der Meer and Anna Maria Oudt. From this marriage their daughter Renée Annie was born on 14 May 1930.
After the marriage, Michael Machin and his second wife went living in Zandvoort but returned to Amsterdam in October 1934, where they stayed at different addresses. But on 2 May 1938 they moved into a house at Van Breestraat 42, where in 1941 Michael was registered by the Jewish Council. Michael Machin was never deported; he died in Amsterdam on 15 April 1942 but it is not known where he was interred.
Sources include the City Archives of Amsterdam, family cards of Hirch Machin (1859) and Michael Machin (1890); archive cards of Michael Machin, Rozette van Praag, Susanna Machin and Anna Elisabeth van der Meer and the archive of the Jewish Council, registration card of Michael Machin.