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The photographer B. Harris, who passed away at the age of 73 from cancer, left school at 16 to become a messenger boy, and eventually became among the most esteemed British photojournalists of his era.

An International Career

He journeyed across the globe as a freelance or a staffer for Fleet Street titles, covering such events as the collapse of the Berlin Wall, famine in Ethiopia and Sudan, the Troubles in Northern Ireland, battlefields in the Balkan region and across Africa, the aftermath of the Falklands conflict and four US election campaigns. He also created lyrical landscapes of the rural areas around his Essex home.

According to his estimates he took more than two million images, taking an average of 100 a day, but he made that count some years back. He continued posting historical and recent images daily on social media until a few weeks before his passing, and had been arranging to give a talk on his life and work.

Memorable Assignments

Tales from a rollercoaster career featured an expenses-shredding business class flight in 1991 to attend the burial in India of the slain politician Rajiv Gandhi, where he fainted from heatstroke and pneumonia and was cooled down with ice that had been used to preserve the body.

His 1983 images of the at that time Labour party leader Neil Kinnock with his wife, Glenys, falling into the tide on Brighton beach were published across multiple columns of a front page, and are regularly reproduced as a hideous example of staged photo hubris. His 2016 memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, was named after an irritated John Major hitting him with a folded briefing paper.

Professional Milestones

He became the a major newspaper’s most youthful staff photographer when he joined the paper in 1976, at the age of 26, and was based around the world for nearly a decade, including coverage of the end of the internal conflict in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). He later stepped down over what he saw as editing of his strongest images of starvation in Africa.

In 1986 Harris became chief photographer as the team was put together to create a new newspaper. He was instrumental in shaping the style of editorial photography that the paper became known for, helping set new standards for news photography and newspaper design, in striking images covering multiple pages. Among many awards, he was honoured as the industry-recognised photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in the former Eastern Bloc documenting the fall of communism.

He operated independently after being let go in 1999, and major projects after that included a year spent capturing cemeteries across the world in 2006 for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, which led to an display launched in London – where he gave a private viewing to the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a emotional book, Remembered.

Early Life and Start

Harris was born in east London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an electrician who later assisted him build a darkroom in the garage. In the mid 1950s, the family moved farther east – and to a better area – to the Rise Park housing estate in Romford, Essex. Brian went to Chase Cross secondary modern school, learning practical skills in woodwork and metalwork, before departing at 16.

At a Fleet Street agency, he quickly advanced from messenger boy to photographer, and began his working life at east London local papers before progressing to major publications.

Colleagues and Legacy

Fellow photographers, often outpaced by him, recalled his work as remarkable. Nick Turpin, who worked with him in the early days, called him “a great and brave photographer”, an inspiration to a generation of junior colleagues. Another associate, a freelance organiser, said he “transformed the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ peak era”.

Private World

In 2001 Harris made contact through a online service with Nikki Bertroya, whom he had initially encountered as a three-year-old in infant school, and they became close companions through his remaining years. After receiving his terminal diagnosis, they went on a road trip in Europe, posting sunny images of good meals and good wine, and revisiting important sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His final project, completed a short time before his death, was to donate his vast archive of 55 years’ work to a long-term repository. Among his favourite archive images he reflected on a youthful Harris consuming generous servings of wine with the actor Helen Mirren: “What a blessed life I’ve had – no remorse and no ‘Must Do’s’”.

He was wed twice, each union concluded with divorce.

He is survived by Nikki, his son Jacob, from his second marriage, Nikki’s daughter, Holly, and by his sister, Jan.