As a child, Humphrey learnt photography from his older brother Michael Spender and was given a handsome German camera for his tenth birthday.

Spender became a member of the Mass Observation movement, taking pictures of daily life in working class communities.

[2] Taken in a period between 1937 and 1940, his photographs cover the full range of Mass-Observation's interests – politics and elections; religion; street scenes; industrial landscapes; the public house; market scenes; new buildings and developments; observers in action; sport and leisure time; work in the textile mills; on holiday in Blackpool; street hoardings and advertisements.

In December 1944 during World War II, Spender was staying at the Hotel Gruenwalder in Innsbruck, Austria as part of his reconnaissance work with the Royal Army Service Corps.

On 17 December, Spender encountered Heinrich Himmler, the notorious head of the Nazi SS who had arrived at the hotel unannounced armed with a team of soldiers.

Because of his mother's German-Jewish ancestry and his time spent in Germany, Spender luckily was conversant in the language and quietly left the hotel unnoticed.

[citation needed] In about 1955 he abandoned photography for painting and textile design, and taught at the Royal College of Art from 1953 until he retired in 1975.