Thomas Amis was born in North Carolina sometime in the 1730s or 1740s. Amis represented Bladen County in the North Carolina Provincial Congress in 1776 and later served as a captain in the 3rd North Carolina Regiment of the Continental Army. After the American Revolution, Thomas Amis relocated to western North Carolina in present-day Hawkins County. In addition to his own mercantile interests, he also corresponded with Richard Bennehan, his brother-in-law, who was a prominent merchant in Orange County, North Carolina. Amis died in Rogersville, Tennessee on December 4, 1797.