Mr Charles Thomas Cecil was born in Penge, Surrey, England on 22 January 1891 and was baptised on 8 March that same year.

He was the son of Thomas John Cecil (b. 1853), a hairdresser, and Mary Stewart (b. 1860), natives of Gloucestershire and Lambeth, London respectively who had married in 1885; and he had two siblings: Alice May (b. 1888) and Ernest Stuart (b. 1896).

Charles first appears on the 1891 census as a 2-month-old infant living with his family at 86 Beckenham Road, Penge. Between then and 1901 the family had uprooted and moved to Cardiff where his brother was born in 1896. They eventually settled in Southampton and appeared there on the 1901 census living at 85 Derby Road and would still be there at the time of the census in 1911. By that time Charles was described as an unmarried ship's steward.

When he signed-on to the Titanic, on 4 April 1912, Cecil gave his address as 194 Millbrook Road, (Southampton) and his previous ship as the St Louis. As a third class steward he could expect monthly wages of £3, 15s.

Charles Cecil died in the sinking and his body, if recovered, was never identified.

His parents remained in Southampton and later lived at Savona on Winsor Road in Woodlands; his father died on 14 December 1935 but what became of his mother is not clear.

His siblings both went on to marry a set of siblings:

His brother Ernest was married in 1918 to Rosalind Annie Chamberlain (1894-1980) of Southampton, the daughter of a shipping clerk. Ernest died in Carmarthen, Wales in 1991.

His sister was married in 1919 to Fitzroy George William Chamberlain (1892-1973), Rosalind's brother who was an engineer. They had a daughter named June and later settled in Knowle, Bristol where Alice died on 18 April 1976.