Born in Gloucester, Massachusetts, Calef attended the United States Military Academy, where he graduated 22nd in the Class of 1862. He was commissioned in to the 5th Regiment of Artillery upon graduation, and fought with it in the Peninsula Campaign and at Antietam. He transferred to Battery A, 2nd U.S. Artillery and the U.S. Horse Artillery Brigade in October 1862. Upon Calef's death in St. Louis, Missouri, on January 14, 1912, he was laid to rest at the Post Cemetery at the United States Military Academy in West Point, New York.