Henry Bowman Brady was born on February 22, 1835, in Gateshead, Durham, England.

He was a British pharmacist and micropalaeontologist. He and his older brother George Stewardson were both educated at the Ackworth and the Bootham Schools in York. He was apprenticed for four years to a chemist in Leeds, after which he studied for a short time at the Newcastle College of Medicine. In 1855, after passing his exams in pharmacy, he set himself up as a wholesale and retail pharmacist in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne. He also served as a Treasurer (1864-1870) and President (1872-1873) of the British Pharmaceutical Conference. His ability gained him the support of the medical profession and the confidence of the public, and his business, which included substantial exports and the sale of scientific apparatus, flourished. Indeed, so well did it prosper that in 1876, at the age of forty-one, he was able to retire and devote the rest of his life to the pursuit of his main interest - the Foraminifera. In 1878, he began his monumental work on the foraminifera of the “Challenger Expedition”, for which he eventually supplied the manuscript for 814 pages of text while superintending the preparation of 115 plates of the highest quality. He twice journeyed around the world, visiting, amongst other places, India, China, Japan, Java, the Pacific Islands, Australia, New Zealand, and the U.S.A.

He died on January 10, 1891, in Bournemouth, England.