Fire Masks, Hampstead, London

1939–1944 · Virkested

London

1939–1945 · Bopæl

London

1940

Vogue's war photographer: London under the bombs

When Germany's aerial bombardment of London began, Miller was living with Penrose at Downshire Hill in Hampstead. Ignoring pleas from friends and family to return to the US, she embarked on a new career as Vogue's official war photographer, documenting what became known as the Blitz.

1940

“Surrealism To-Day” at the Zwemmer Gallery

Four of her photographs — “Egypt” (1939), “Roumania” (1938), “Libya” (1939) and “Sinai” (1939) — were shown in the Zwemmer Gallery's 1940 exhibition Surrealism To-Day in London.

1941

“Britain at War” at MoMA

In 1941 the Museum of Modern Art in New York included her work in the exhibition Britain at War. No other exhibition would include her photographs until Edward Steichen's The Family of Man in 1955.

December 1942

War correspondent accredited to the US Army

Because the British Army would not let her accompany it, from December 1942 Miller got herself accredited to the US Army as a war correspondent for Condé Nast Publications. Her first article for British Vogue was on nurses at an army base in Oxford, and she went on to photograph nurses across Europe, including on the front lines.