Cecil Beaton's rare war photography – in pictures

A sailor on board HMS Alcantara uses a portable sewing machine to repair a signal flag during a voyage to Sierra Leone Photograph: Cecil Beaton/Imperial War Museum

Bomb damage to HMV (His Master’s Voice) gramophone shop, Oxford Street, London, 1940. The shop had been opened by Sir Edward Elgar in 1921
Photograph: Cecil Beaton/Imperial War Museum

The Blitz, London, 1942. A workman with a wheelbarrow clears up fallen debris from the roof of St Mary-le-Bow after its first bombing. Subsequently the church was completely destroyed
Photograph: Cecil Beaton/Imperial War Museum

Bomb damage to the church of St Lawrence Jewry, Guildhall, London, 1940
Photograph: Cecil Beaton/Imperial War Museum

A welder works on the deck of a new ship, Tyneside, 1943 Photograph: Cecil Beaton /Imperial War Museum

Bomb damage to a fire station, Tobruk, Libya, 1942 Photograph: Cecil Beaton /Imperial War Museum

Men of the Long Range Desert Group after returning to headquarters at the end of a desert patrol, Siwa, Libya, 1942
Photograph: Cecil Beaton/Imperial War Museum

China, 1944: the Chinese assistant chief of police and his staff grouped in a circular doorway at headquarters in Chengdu
Photograph: Cecil Beaton/Imperial War Museum

A wren serving with the crew of a harbour launch in Portsmouth, 1941
Photograph: Cecil Beaton/Imperial War Museum

Villagers cross duckboards over floating bamboo poles, Guangxi, China, 1944. The poles are being soaked in fresh water to prepare them for construction use
Photograph: Cecil Beaton/Imperial war Museum

Flying Officer Neville Duke of No 92 (East India) Squadron. Duke was a Battle of Britain pilot and is pictured here with his Spitfire at RAF Biggin Hill in 1941. After the war, Duke became one of Britain's leading test pilots and broke the world air-speed record in 1953
Photograph: Cecil Beaton/Imperial War Museum

A man and his daughter pass posters in Cairo, Egypt, 1942
Photograph: Cecil Beaton/Imperial War Museum

A British sailor on shore leave, Harrogate, 1941
Photograph: Cecil Beaton/Imperial War Museum