Captain, South African Medical Corps, attached South African Labour Corps.
Died 13th October 1918, age 24.
Buried at Dordrecht, South Africa.
Former student of medicine.
Charles was born on the 1st January 1894 in York, the son of the Reverand James Todd from Sale, Cheshire. He was educated at Manchester Grammar School (1905-1910) after which he entered Manchester University to study medicine where he served in the University Officer Training Corps(1912-1914). He was fascinated by Mammalian Anatomy and spent many hours studying the Museum’s Natural History Collections. He was still studying when World War One began; but served as the Manchester Grammar School Cadets Medical Officer before graduating in 1915 with an M.B. , Ch.B. He went to work as a House Surgeon at the Manchester Ear Hospital but caught tuberculosis probably through his work there. This meant he was classed as unfit for military service. However determined to serve he joined the Merchant Navy as a ship’s doctor and from there determined to reach the fighting front managed to get into the Army in South Africa. He was later commissioned into the South African Medical Corps and was attached as Medical Officer to a unit of the South African Labour Corps. Despite his delicate health, exacerbated by his catching malaria, he served with them in France from 1917, however he was wounded by a gas shell and was returned to South Africa. Ill and suffering from the effects of gas poisoning he caught influenza and died of pneumonia on 13th October 1918 at Dordrecht, South Africa aged 24.
Charles is not in the Commonwealth War Graves Commission database, and the 1922 University Roll of Service indicates he did serve some of his time with the Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC). He left effects worth £49 16s 7d to Katherine Todd, a widow.