 Born in 1860, he was the second son of (Daniel) Augustus Nanton (1831–1873) and his wife Louisa (1831-1906), daughter of William Botsford Jarvis of Rosedale.His middle name was for his uncle and godfather, Edmund Allen Meredith.Nanton's father, a barrister and partner of Sir Alexander Tilloch Galt, had emigrated from England where he had been educated at Eton and Oxford.