Arthur Charles Davies (known as Charlie) was born in Bristol, the second son of Thomas Edmond Davies (1839-1908) and his wife Maria Jane Fox, the daughter and coheiress of Alderman John Fox, JP. Fox-Davies was brought up at Coalbrookdale in Shropshire, where his father worked for the Coalbrookdale Iron Company; his grandfather, Charles Davies of Cardigan in Wales, had been an ironmonger. He added his mother's maiden name to his own by deed poll on his nineteenth birthday in 1890, thereby changing his surname from Davies to Fox-Davies. In 1894, his father took the same course for himself and the rest of the family.