[3] He was one of six children of Sir Ewen Cameron, 1st Baronet, of Fassiefern in the parish of Kilmallie, and his first wife, Louisa (daughter of Duncan Campbell of Barcaldine and Glenure),[2][4][a] Nursed by the wife of a family retainer whose son, Ewen McMillan, was his foster-brother and faithful attendant through life, young Cameron grew up in close sympathy with the traditions and associations of his home and people, who looked to his father as the representative head of the clan in the enforced absence of the chief of Lochiel.

[3] After the outbreak of the French Revolutionary Wars, at his special request, a commission was obtained for Cameron, and he entered the army in May 1793 as Ensign in the 26th Cameronians, before being promoted as lieutenant in a newly-formed Highland Company, attached to the old 93rd Foot (Shirley's, disbanded after Demerara).

He served as a captain in his regiment at the occupation of the Île-d'Houat off Brittany and at Cadiz in 1800 before fighting in Egypt, where he was wounded at the Battle of Alexandria, receiving the Ottoman Porte Gold Medal for the Egyptian Campaign.

[3] Upon the return of 1st Battalion Gordon Highlanders from La Coruña, Cameron was transferred to its command and led the regiment in the Walcheren Campaign, subsequently proceeding to Portugal landing there on 8 October 1810.

Some particulars of the armorial and other honours bestowed upon Cameron in recognition of his military service can be found in Cannon's Historical Record, 92nd Highlanders[3] and in Burke's Peerage & Baronetage.

During the Waterloo Campaign, Cameron's 92nd Foot alongside the 42nd Highlanders, 1st Royals, and 44th East Essex, formed General Pack's 9th Brigade of Sir Thomas Picton's 5th Division, and were among the first troops to march out of Brussels at daybreak on 16 June 1815.

At the request of his family, Cameron's remains were disinterred soon afterwards, brought home in a man-of-war and, in the presence of a gathering of three thousand highlanders from the then still populous district of Lochaber, were laid to rest in Kilmallie churchyard where an obelisk inscribed with a quotation by Sir Walter Scott marks the site of his grave.