John Lennon’s acoustic guitar has been sold at auction in California for $2.4 million.

The Beatle is thought to have recorded and written a number of hit songs, including Love Me Do and I Want to Hold Your Hand, on the Gibson J-160E guitar.

The guitar was one of only two of its type flown from the US to England in 1962 for John Lennon and George Harrison.

John Lennon used the guitar for about a year before swapping it with George Harrison in 1963, after which vanished.

For more than 50 years the guitar’s whereabouts remained unknown until a man in California discovered last year that an instrument in his possession may have historical value.

The Associated Press has named the man as John McCaw from San Diego, who bought the guitar for $275 in the late 1960s.

In 2014, John McCaw found an old magazine article about George Harrison, which featured a photo of the instrument.

The guitar was then looked at by Beatles’ instruments expert Andy Babiuk, who was able to identify it by its unique markings as the one John Lennon used.

Andy Babiuk compared it with photographs and film footage of John Lennon playing it.