The son of a civil engineer, Henry Snell spent his youth in the region around Plymouth, England. At the age of sixteen, he was sent to New York to work with his father's friend George Attrill in a gas engineering concern. Snell entered the Art Students' League, studying under William Sartain, to develop his drawing skills for his work. Soon after this training, Snell began executing commercial illustrations. It was during this early period that he became friends with the painters William L. Lathrop, Wyant Eaton and Leonard Octman. With Lathrop and Henry Ward Ranger, Snell toured the provinces of Europe in 1887.
The following year, Snell married Florence Francis. The couple may have visited Lathrop at the artist's colony in New Hope, Pennsylvania in 1898, where they eventually settled. Although Snell painted American marines and landscapes, he is best known for his view of the English coastline. From 1899 until 1943, Snell taught at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women (now Moore College of Art). During the summers, he often took his art classes abroad, touring Europe during these trips. In 1916, the artist was in India.
Snell served as the assistant director of Fine Arts for the United States Commission in the Paris Exposition of 1900. He was a president of the American Water Color Society, and won several medals at national expositions during the first two decades of the twentieth century.
