Charles Thomas Hudson (1828-1903), was born in Brompton, London on 11 March 1828. He was the third of five sons of John Corrie Hudson, Chief Clerk of the Legacy Duty Office and his wife Emily. In his youth, his father was an advanced radical and a friend of William Godwin, the Shelleys, Charles Lamb and William Hazlitt.

Hudson was educated at Kensington Grammar School and The Grange Sunderland, and made his early living by teaching. He studied mathematics at St. John's College Cambridge, graduating with a first class degree, and later acheiving an MA and LLD. On leaving Cambridge he taught at Bristol Grammar School, acheiving the post of Headmaster by 1855. In 1861 he opened a private boys' school in Bristol, joining the Bristol Microscopical Society in the same year. He retired from school teaching in 1881, moving from Bristol to Dawlish, Devon in 1891 and then to Shanklin, on the Isle of Wight from 1899, where he remained until his death in 1903.

Hudson was a naturalist, devoting his leisure to microscopical research, giving talks and publishing numerous papers in scientific journals. He became internationally acknowledged as an authority in the study of the Rotifera, a division of tiny multicellular animals in fresh water and marine ecosystems. Elected fellow of the Royal Microscopical Society in 1872, he was president from 1888-1890, and an honorary fellow from 1901 until his death. 

Assisted by the marine zoologist Phillip Henry Gosse, he co-authored the definitive 19th Century monograph 'The Rotifera, or Wheel Animalcules' (Longmans Green & Co, 1886). The work was illustrated by both Hudson and Gosse. 

Hudson's beautiful illustrations of 'The Rotifera' and his ingeniously constructed colour transparencies show how his artistic talent enhanced his dedicated scientific study.