9254 Private Charles Alfred Thomas was born on 14 September 1895 in Brantford, Ontario, the son of Elias Thomas and Charlotte Miller. He had six brothers and two sisters. Thomas was Haudenosaunee from Six Nations First Nation, Oshweken, Ontario

Thomas was working as a telegraph operator and had served with The Queen’s Own Rifles for a year, when he enlisted with the 3rd Battalion CEF on 22 September 1914 at Camp Valcartier in Quebec. He enlisted with his younger brother, Private William Sherman Thomas, who appears to have lied about his age as he was only 15. (William drowned in Fort Erie in 1917.)

In June 1916 he assigned $50 of his pay each month (which would have been most of it had he lived longer) to his brother William. He also for a short time in late 1915 with the Canadian machine gun school.

Private Thomas was killed in action from shelling at the Battle of Mont Sorrel in Belgium at about 2:30 pm on 8 June 1916, aged 20.

He is buried in Railway Dugouts Burial Ground in Belgium, grave reference VI. C. 21. He is also remembered on a family grave marker in Ohsweken Baptist Cemetery, Six Nations, Brant County, and on the Six Nations WWI memorial plaque.