Ernest McCormick

A journalist on the Manchester Guardian, later The Guardian, he was the son of a journalist and the grandson of a newspaper machine room operator. He was the third of five members of the family over four generations to work on newspapers. The younger of his two sisters was a journalist, as is his daughter.

He was born in Meanwood, Leeds, the eldest of four children of Ernest Alfred McCormick who was a reporter and columnist on the Leeds Mercury.

He was educated at Bentley Lane Primary School, Meanwood, Leeds, and William Hulme's Grammar School, Manchester. He left Leeds when he was nine as the family moved to Manchester where his father got a job on the Daily Herald, having left the Leeds Mercury when it was amalgamated with the Yorkshire Post.

Mr McCormick's grandfather Joseph McCormick had also worked on the Leeds Mercury, in the machine room.

He left school at 18 after Matriculation and worked on a local

newspaper. He should have gone to university, but the family could not afford to send all four so none of them went.

At the outbreak of the Second World War, he and two former school friends volunteered for the Fleet Air Arm. He was rejected because of poor eyesight, his two friends were accepted and sailed for training in Trinidad, but their ship was torpedoed and there were no survivors. It left an indelible mark. He refused to volunteer again: "If they want me, they can come and get me," he said. Until they did he served with his father in the Local Defence Volunteers, the forerunner of the Home Guard, usually patrolling the local park accompanied by the family dog.

When he was called up in 1941, he served with the Royal Artillery in India and Burma. It was an experience he never discussed. And he never forgot the sacrifice of his friends, giving thanks each year for his own survival.

When he was demobbed in 1946 he returned to work as a journalist firstly on the City News, in Manchester, then on the Manchester Evening News and, from 1948 until 1975 on the Manchester Guardian, later The Guardian. There he was variously a reporter, Air Correspondent and Night News Editor.

When The Guardian moved entirely to London in 1975 he took redundancy

and went to Edinburgh to be Deputy Press and Information Officer to the newly formed Lothian Regional Health Board, later becoming Press and Information Officer until he eventually retired in 1988.

But he remained a journalist at heart. He had an analytical and logical mind and an encyclopaedic knowledge, as well as a love of the

English language which he could not bear to see mangled.

He was a very principled man with a firm faith, and a deep sense of duty and loyalty, especially to his family, firm in his views, he did not suffer fools. He was also a very kind man, quiet and reserved,

with an impish sense of humour, and an impish grin to match.

Although he lived most of his life in Manchester, then Scotland, returning to Yorkshire to live in Otley 10 years ago, he was at heart always a Yorkshireman and never lost his loyalty to his county, "I'm a missionary", he would say.

Mr McCormick, who was twice married, is survived by his daughter and son, his stepson, four grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

A funeral service will be held at St Hilda's Church, Cross Green, Leeds, on Tuesday, at 1pm.