Charles Merritt was born in about 1651 and arrived in Virginia in about 1666. From 1686 to about 1691 he worked as an overseer on a plantation near the Blackwater River and had interactions with the Weyanokes who lived nearby. Merritt later moved to land further east near the present-day College of William and Mary. There he supposedly was accused of stealing hogs and went to North Carolina to avoid prosecution. In 1707 he gave a deposition in support of North Carolina's boundary claim with Virginia and was described at that time as a major. He died in Chowan County, North Carolina in 1718.