 In 1945, after the end of World War II, Barns returned to the University of Oxford having been appointed the Lady Wallis Budge Research Fellow in Egyptology at University College, Oxford.He worked with and was mentored by Battiscombe Gunn (the then Professor of Egyptology) for the next five years, until Gunn's death in 1950.He continued to hold the Lady Wallis Budge Fellowship until 1953.