Edward Charles Frome was born on 7 January 1802 in Gibraltar, where his father, the Rev. J.T. Frome, was a military chaplain. After being educated at Bexley and Blackheath, he entered the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich in 1817. In 1827 as a lieutenant in the Royal Engineers, Frome was posted to Canada and spent nearly six years on the staff of Colonel John By, who was engaged in the construction of the Rideau Canal connecting the Ottawa River with Lake Ontario. The settlement founded by By to support the canal's construction, known as Bytown, was incorporated in 1850, but became the city of Ottawa in 1855, and the capital of Canada in 1857.

During a distinguished career, Frome later served as Surveyor-General of South Australia and of Mauritius; Commanding Royal Engineer in Scotland, Ireland and Gibraltar; Inspector-General of Fortifications; and Lieutenant-Governor of Guernsey. Frome’s hobby was drawing and painting, and from the time of his earliest travels he recorded the places he visited by pen and pencil sketches and water colours, some of them mere impressions of a scene, but for the most part meticulously detailed records recalling the accurate eye and thorough professional skill of the engineer and surveyor.