Charles Thomas Shorter

Baptised Charles Thomas Shorter on 5 November 1893 at St Mary's Church but listed in Censuses as born the following year. Eldest child of Wheatley-born Charles Shorter (senior), general labourer, and Elizabeth Ann nee Cherry, born in Deddington, Oxon. They lived in Blenheim, Wheatley in 1901. He attended the Congregational Chapel Sunday School in 1902. He was a butcher's errand boy in 1911. The Soldiers of Oxfordshire website attributes the Regimental No. 45223 to him as Private Charles T. Shorter. He had enlisted on 10 October 1914, embarking for France on 8 September 1915. He appears to have been gassed, consequently being admitted to the General Hospital in Rouen with gas poisoning, bronchitis and neurasthenia. He was transferred to Salonika on 20 November. He had a few disciplinary problems, once being late returning from a pass - the punishment being three days confined to barracks - and another time failing to salute an officer (the Provost Marshal), for which he received seven days. Charles married Dorothy E. Hott in December 1919, the marriage being registered in Headington. His parents were living in the Manor House, Wheatley in 1921. He died in December 1976.