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The photojournalist B. Harris, who has died at the age of 73 of cancer, ended his schooling at 16 to become a messenger boy, and went on to become among the most esteemed British documentary photographers of his era.

An International Career

He journeyed across the globe as a freelance or a employee for Fleet Street publications, covering major happenings including the collapse of the Berlin Wall, drought and hunger in Ethiopia and Sudan, the Troubles in Northern Ireland, war zones in the Balkans and throughout Africa, the consequences of the Falklands war and four 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 shot over 2m images, taking an average of 100 a day, but he made that count some years back. He kept sharing archive and recent images each day on social media until a few weeks before his passing, and had been arranging to deliver a lecture on his life and work.

Memorable Assignments

Tales from a rollercoaster career featured an costly premium flight in 1991 to attend the burial 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’s images of the at that time Labour party leader Neil Kinnock with his wife, Glenys, falling into the sea 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’s memoir, ... And Then the Prime Minister Hit Me, took the title from an irritated John Major striking him with a rolled-up 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 almost ten years, including coverage of the end of the civil war in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). He eventually resigned over what he considered censorship of his strongest images of famine in Africa.

In 1986 Harris became chief photographer as the team was assembled to create a new newspaper. He was instrumental in shaping the style of journalistic photography that the paper was famous for, helping raise the bar for news photography and broadsheet design, in striking images filling multiple pages. Among numerous awards, he was named the What the Papers Say photographer of the year in 1990 for his work in eastern Europe documenting 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 Commonwealth War Graves Commission, which led to an display launched in London – where he gave a personal tour to Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh – and a moving book, Remembered.

Early Life and Beginnings

Harris was raised in east London, to Dorothy and Leonard Harris, an electrician who later assisted him construct a photo lab in the garage. In the 1950s, the family relocated eastwards – and up in the world – to the Rise Park housing estate in Romford, Essex. Brian went to Chase Cross secondary modern school, acquiring practical skills in carpentry and metalwork, before leaving at 16.

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

Peers and Legacy

Other photographers, often scooped by him, remembered his work as remarkable. A colleague, who worked with him in the early days, described him as “a superb and brave photographer”, an influence to a generation of junior colleagues. Tim Dawson, a freelance organiser, said he “transformed the possibilities of news photography during newspapers’ peak era”.

Personal Life

In 2001 Harris made contact through a online service with Nikki, whom he had first met as a three-year-old in primary school, and they became inseparable partners through his final decades. After receiving his terminal diagnosis, they embarked on a road trip in Europe, posting bright images of good meals and good wine, and revisiting significant sites including Dresden and Ypres.

His last task, finished a short time before his death, was to transfer his extensive collection of five decades of work to a permanent home. Among his preferred historical photos he reflected on a very young 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 married 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.