His parents ran a general store and Charles left school at 13 to help them run the business.

He trained as a butcher and opened a shop in Wyke in 1864, the same year he married Mary Ann Cragg.

[4] Crossland initially became interested in botany in 1880, whilst helping one of his daughters with a Sunday school wild flower project.

He joined the Halifax Scientific Society to pursue his new-found enthusiasm, and subsequently the Yorkshire Naturalists' Union.

In 1888, at a YNU fungus foray, Crossland met George Edward Massee who encouraged him to take an interest in fungi.

[5] As a result, he developed an expertise in mycology, with a particular interest in the discomycetes, making extensive local collections, often in the company of Henry Thomas Soppitt and fellow mycologist and bryologist James Needham.