Born in Surrey, Cain attended the Camberwell School of Art and then the Royal College of Art under Frank Short. He worked as an illustrator cartoonist for the Johannesburg Star before serving in World War I with the British Army as part of the Border Regiment. After the war the Imperial War Museum purchased some of his drawings. Much of his work included scenes from India and the Middle East. His work is held in the V&A Museum, the British Museum, the National Gallery of Art in the USA, the Yale Center for British Art and the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.
