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The photojournalist B. Harris, who has died at the age of 73 from cancer, ended his schooling at 16 to work as a courier, and went on to become one of the most respected British photojournalists of his generation.

An International Career

He travelled across the globe as a freelance or a employee for Fleet Street publications, documenting such events as the fall of the Berlin Wall, famine in Ethiopia and Sudan, the conflict in Northern Ireland, war zones in the Balkan region and throughout Africa, the aftermath of the Falklands conflict and several US presidential campaigns. He also created lyrical scenic views of the rural areas around his home county of Essex home.

According to his estimates he took more than two million photographs, taking an average of 100 a day, but he made that count several years ago. He continued posting historical and new images daily on social media until a short time before his death, and had been arranging to deliver a lecture on his career and experiences.

Notable Assignments

Stories from a rollercoaster career featured an expenses-shredding business class flight in 1991 to attend the burial in India of the assassinated leader Rajiv Gandhi, where he fainted from sunstroke and pneumonia and was treated with ice that had been employed to cool the body.

His 1983 images of the then Labour party leader Neil Kinnock with his wife, Glenys, toppling into the tide on Brighton beach were carried across eight columns of a leading page, and are often reprinted as a striking example of photo-opportunity hubris. His 2016 memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, was named after an irritated John Major hitting him with a rolled-up briefing paper.

Professional Milestones

He became the a major newspaper’s youngest ever staff photographer when he started there in 1976, at the age of 26, and worked around the world for nearly a decade, including reporting of the end of the civil war in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). He eventually resigned over what he saw as censorship of his strongest images of starvation in Africa.

In 1986 Harris was made head photographer as the team was assembled to create a new newspaper. He was instrumental in forming the style of journalistic photography that the paper became known for, helping set new standards for press images and newspaper design, in dramatic images filling front and back pages. Among numerous awards, he was honoured as the industry-recognised photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in eastern Europe recording the collapse of communism.

He worked as a freelance after being made redundant in 1999, and significant projects after that included a year spent capturing cemeteries across the world in 2006 for the war memorial organisation, which led to an exhibition 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 Beginnings

Harris was born in eastern London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an electrician who later assisted him construct a photo lab in the garage. In the mid 1950s, the family relocated eastwards – and to a better area – to the Rise Park housing estate in Romford, Essex. Brian attended Chase Cross secondary modern school, learning useful skills in woodwork and metal crafting, before leaving at 16.

At a central London agency, he quickly advanced from delivery boy to photographer, and launched his professional career at eastern London local papers before moving on to national publications.

Colleagues and Legacy

Fellow photographers, often scooped by him, recalled his work as astonishing. A colleague, who worked with him in the early days, called him “a superb and brave photographer”, an inspiration to a cohort of junior colleagues. Tim Dawson, a union representative, said he “reimagined the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ last golden age”.

Private World

In 2001 Harris made contact through a website with Nikki, whom he had initially encountered as a three-year-old in infant school, and they became inseparable partners through his final decades. After learning of his illness, they went on a driving tour in Europe, sharing bright images of good meals and quality drinks, and revisiting significant sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His final project, completed a few weeks before his demise, was to donate his vast archive of five decades of work to a long-term repository. Among his preferred archive images he commented on a youthful Harris drinking large glasses of wine with the actor Helen Mirren: “What a fortunate life I’ve had – no remorse and no ‘Must Do’s’”.

He was wed twice, both marriages ended in divorce.

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