George Hudson payment of 12 shillings and 6 pence recorded in the Howsham poor book as being “received of George Hudson for bastardry”. Hudson was apprenticed to Bell and Nicholson, a firm of drapers in College Street, York. He finished his apprenticeship in 1820, was taken on as a tradesman, and given a share in the business early in 1821. On 17 July that year he married Nicholson's daughter Elizabeth. When Bell retired, the firm became Nicholson and Hudson. By 1827 the company was the largest drapery, indeed the largest business, in York. In 1827, his great-uncle Matthew Botrill fell ill and
George Hudson would be foremost amongst Hudson's critics.< Opening to a junction on the Leeds to Selby line took place on 29 May 1839 and to Normanton on 1 July 1840 meaning London was now linked by rail to York. On 9 November 1840 the YNMR leased the Leeds and Selby Railway for £17,000 per year and Hudson propmptly closed the line so passengers had to use his route via Castleford. Other lines built by the YNMR under Hudson's chairmanship included those to Pickering and Scarborough both of which were authorised on 4 July 1844. The then isolated Whitby – Pickering Railway