[1] He then studied in France, and became a member of the Pont-Aven School, painting genre subjects of French country life, many sold back in America.

He first traveled to Egypt in 1897, and then developed an interest in Orientalist painting, soon spending his winters in the Middle East, dying in Cairo.

[2] During the American Civil War, he enlisted in the Union Army on 16 July 1861 and acted as a field artist for Frank Leslie's Weekly while he served as a soldier within the 13th Massachusetts Infantry.

At that time, he switched from oils to watercolours which he believed was the optimal medium to capture the transparent light of the Middle East.

From 1890 to 1898, he translated from the French annual volumes about the Paris Salon with illustrations by Goupil & Cie. Bacon died of a heart attack in Cairo, Egypt, in 1912.