Photos - Second World War

The Home Front in Britain during the Second World War

VE DAY Celebrations in London, 8 May 1945

Wartime Communications: The Work of the Court Post Office, Buckingham Palace c.1941

OPERATION PEDESTAL, AUGUST 1942

Captured German U-boats outside their pen at Trondheim in Norway, 19 May 1945.

A North American Mustang Mk I of No. 168 Squadron banking over Pierrefitte-en-Cinglais in Normandy on a tactical reconnaissance sortie, August 1944. Allied tanks can be seen on the road below.

Winston Churchill and General Charles de Gaulle walk down the Avenue des Champs-Elysee duirng the French Armistice Day parade in Paris, 11 November 1944.

Winston Churchill in a jeep outside the German Reichstag during a tour of the ruined city of Berlin, 16 July 1945.

Supermarine Spitfire Mk VB of No. 165 Squadron at Gravesend, Essex, 16 October 1942.

Supermarine Spitfire Mk VBs of No. 81 Squadron RAF, June 1942.

Winston Churchill with British and Soviet representatives, including Anthony Eden and Vyacheslav Molotov, in London following the signing of the Anglo-Soviet Treaty on 26 May 1942.

Supermarine Spitfire Mk IIa aircraft of the Air Fighting Development Unit based at Duxford, 6 April 1942.

A small child on deck with his life belt on board SS EMPRESS OF AUSTRALIA, August 1941.

Commandos of 48 (RM) Commando coming ashore from landing craft at St Aubin-sur-Mer on Juno Beach, 6 June 1944.

HMS EAGLE and HMS MALAYA in the Mediterranean during Operation 'Spotter', which delivered 16 RAF Spitfire Mk Vs to Malta on 7th March 1942.

Winston Churchill inspecting air raid damage in the dockyard area of Valletta, Malta, 19 November 1943.

The aircraft carrier HMS SLINGER, December 1944.

A kite balloon tethered to the balloon barge NORMAN WADE on the River Humber, at No. 17 Balloon Centre at Sutton-on-Hull in Yorkshire, January 1943.

Squadron Leader Douglas Bader (centre) and fellow pilots of No. 242 Squadron, Flight Lieutenant Eric Ball and Pilot Officer Willie McKnight, admire the nose art on Bader's Hawker Hurricane at Duxford, October 1940.

Spitfire pilots of No. 19 Squadron RAF gather at Manor Farm, Fowlmere, near Duxford in Cambridgeshire, September 1940.

Hawker Hurricanes of No 1 Squadron, Royal Air Force, based at Wittering, Cambridgeshire, followed by a similar formation of Supermarine Spitfires of No 266 Squadron, during a flying display for aircraft factory workers, October 1940.

A North American Mustang Mk I of No. 268 Squadron RAF opens fire on a railway locomotive during a low-level sortie over Holland, 4 February 1943.

Boulton Paul Defiant Mk I night-fighter of No. 264 Squadron RAF, silhouetted against the clouds during a low-level pass over its base at Biggin Hill, Kent, April 1941.

A Lancaster Mk III of No. 619 Squadron on a test flight from RAF Coningsby, 14 February 1944.