Born on 19 February 1793 in Chester-le-Street, he graduated at Trinity College, Cambridge, before enlisting in the army in 1809. He fought in Spain and Canada and retired on half pay in 1816. Elected a member of the Old Water-Colour Society, London in 1823, his activity as a water-colour painter was principally between 1823 and 1843. He retired from the Society in 1852 and devoted himself increasingly to landscape gardening. He died in London on 2 March 1881.