Eric Gordon died on Easter Monday. His wife Samantha recalls their time together.

I first met Eric when I was a fledgling reporter on the Camden New Journal 32 years ago.

I recall 18 months of seemingly constant criticism of every aspect of my work. Thus on a Thursday morning, with those dreaded words: “Sammy, here a second…”

I would go into his office to get a tirade that was, in fact, a tutorial not just of how to handle journalism, but how to handle life. “You have to change, Sammy!” he used to say.

When I left the CNJ for a stop-start career on the nationals it was Eric I turned to when the abrupt sackings left me jobless and penniless.

His advice was always wise and incisive, directing me to the NUJ or some other immediate help.

I should have realised then that behind that gruff façade was a man of great kindness. As well as taking me back as a sub-editor when times were tough, he quietly helped me through my mother’s terminal illness with cancer.

From that dreadful tragedy we became closer and eventually married. Early in our relationship my husband encouraged me to pursue my life’s dream of becoming a doctor and thanks to him I am now a consultant eye surgeon.

Over our 26 years together he said again and again he would stand back from the CNJ yet he never did. Almost all our holiday videos include at least one phone call to the office, including on our honeymoon at a windy Loch Lomond.

His attention to the detailed running of the CNJ covered all areas and, yes, right up until he died he was producing his John Gulliver column, texting me to “come home, URGENT!” to find out that there was a paper jam in the printer or some other minor crisis on a deadline.

I would come home to find him red faced and swearing at the printer like Victor Meldrew.

Sam and Eric on their wedding day

He voraciously watched alternative news and read four papers every day, including The Morning Star and a host of others like The London Review of Books and Tribune which he piled around the house drawing rings and arrows on them to point out stories or letters of interest he’d read.

He even used to go through my medical journals, applying his questioning eye and nose for news to papers so obscure I wondered what he saw in them (of course they would go on to be front page leads!)

He had a whimsical taste in distractions so everything would stop for his favourite Doc Martin, Montalbano or the latest Scandi noir.

Or he might fall asleep on the sofa while I played the piano. His love of music was to be a comfort in his final illness.

One thing Eric taught me is to never squash yourself into moulds – push for your maximum potential and don’t give up.

He never stopped pushing me to do better, and for me that, above all else, was what made him a wonderful husband.

We certainly did have a lovely time.