Emanuel was born on 16 April 1904 in St George in the East, London. His father Bernard, an upholsterer, was born in Poland and his mother Betty was from Hungary. Their first two daughters Minnie and Rebecca were born in Hungary and the family travelled to England where their next daughter Sarah was born in 1903. They had two more children Emanuel and Harry who was born in 1913.

Emanuel married Rachel Ogin in 1929 in Stepney, London and they had two children, Betty and Bernard. Before Emanuel enlisted in the RAMC, he worked as a salesman. On 15 September 1941, Emanuel died in the Cambridge Hospital, Aldershot, and his cause of death was Acute Leukaemia.