He was born in Weymouth, Dorset and educated at the Royal Hospital School, Greenwich, at that time noted for its advanced mathematical training.
[1] Tizard was largely responsible for an important series of observations on the surface and under-currents in the Straits of Gibraltar, which set at rest the vexed question of the movements of these waters.
The Challenger expedition resulted in a vast increase of knowledge of the physical condition of the oceans and of the distribution of marine life, and in the progressive improvement of apparatus and methods of research.
Tizard remained with the Challenger until she paid off in 1876, and spent the next three years at the Admiralty writing the narrative of the voyage in association with Sir John Murray.
He was at first in command of the hired vessel the Knight-Errant and then of HMS Triton (1882), the first British ship to be built specifically for survey work.