He was born in the Fulneck Moravian Settlement, near Leeds, to the Reverend Benjamin Latrobe, of Huguenot descent, and the American-born Anna Margaretta Antes.

He described his journey with coloured illustrations in Journal of a Visit to South Africa in 1815 and 1816: With Some Account of the Missionary Settlements of the United Brethren, Near the Cape of Good Hope.

He purchased a number of music scores and oratorios from Breitkopf & Härtel in Leipzig, near Niesky, when they were not published due to a perceived lack of interest.

In an 1817 letter to Vincent Novello Latrobe mentioned a conversation with Gottfried Christoph Härtel in Leipzig concerning works "...printed -- and a whole wheelbarrow full of [manuscript] music scores and some good German oratorios which I bought for a trifle.

He also wrote clarinet concertos (now lost), duets and arias, and more than a hundred vocal pieces, among which were "Lord of Life Now Sweetly Slumber", "How Shall a Mortal Song Aspire" (from his cantata "Dawn of Glory"), "Psalm 51" ("Miserere mei Deus") and "We Praise Thee, Oh God".