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The photographer B. Harris, who has died at the age of 73 from cancer, left school at 16 to work as a courier, and eventually became one of the most respected UK photojournalists of his generation.

A Global Professional Journey

He travelled across the globe as a freelance or a employee for Fleet Street titles, covering such events as the fall of the Berlin Wall, drought and hunger in Ethiopia and Sudan, the conflict in Northern Ireland, battlefields in the Balkans and across Africa, the consequences of the Falklands conflict and several US election campaigns. He also created poetic landscapes of the countryside around his Essex home.

By his own calculation he shot over 2m images, averaging 100 a day, but he stated that figure several years ago. He kept sharing archive and recent images each day on social media until a short time before his passing, and had been planning to deliver a lecture on his career and experiences.

Notable Assignments

Stories from a rollercoaster career included an expenses-shredding premium flight in 1991 to attend the funeral in India of the slain politician Rajiv Gandhi, where he fainted from sunstroke and pneumonia and was treated 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, toppling into the sea on Brighton beach were published across eight columns of a leading page, and are regularly reproduced as a striking example of staged photo hubris. His 2016’s memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, took the title from an exasperated John Major striking 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 worked around the world for almost ten years, including coverage of the end of the internal conflict in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). He eventually resigned over what he considered editing of his strongest images of famine in Africa.

In 1986 Harris was made head photographer as the team was assembled to create a major newspaper. He played a key role in shaping the style of editorial photography that the paper became known for, helping raise the bar for press images and broadsheet design, in dramatic images covering multiple pages. Among many awards, he was honoured as the What the Papers Say photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in eastern Europe recording the fall of communism.

He operated independently after being made redundant in 1999, and significant projects after that included a year spent capturing cemeteries across the world in 2006 for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, which resulted in 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 eastern London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an technician who later helped his son build a photo lab in the garage. In the mid 1950s, the family moved eastwards – and up in the world – to the Rise Park housing estate in Romford, Essex. Brian attended a local secondary modern school, acquiring useful skills in carpentry and metalwork, before leaving at 16.

At a Fleet Street photo agency, he quickly advanced from delivery boy to photographer, and began his working life at eastern London local papers before moving on to national publications.

Colleagues and Impact

Other photographers, often outpaced by him, remembered his work as remarkable. Nick Turpin, who collaborated with him in the initial stages, described him as “a great and brave photographer”, an influence to a generation of young colleagues. Tim Dawson, a union representative, said he “transformed the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ peak era”.

Private World

In 2001 Harris reconnected through a online service with Nikki Bertroya, whom he had first met as a toddler in primary school, and they became close companions through his remaining years. After learning of his illness, they went on a driving tour in Europe, posting sunny images of good meals and good wine, and returning to significant sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His final project, completed a short time before his demise, was to transfer his vast archive of five decades of work to a long-term repository. Among his preferred historical photos he reflected on a very young Harris drinking generous servings of wine with the actor Helen Mirren: “What a blessed life I’ve had – no regrets and no ‘Must Do’s’”.

He was wed twice, each union concluded with divorce.

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