Exceptional Mirror man’s shock death aged just 48

FORMER Mirror man Paul Field has died suddenly of a suspected heart attack aged just 48.

Paul started on his local paper at 15 and, after an Italian and French degree at Hull, joined the Mirror as a trainee, launching a meteoric career.

At 26, after a stint as a Daily Mail reporter, he became deputy news editor of our sister paper the Sunday People. In 1999, aged just 27, he became Sunday Mirror news editor.

The next year he took the same role at the Mail on Sunday. In 2004 he relaunched the National Enquirer, working in New York as its editor in chief.

He moved to Ireland as editor in chief of the Irish Daily Mail and Irish Mail on Sunday before returning to London. He was appointed associate editor at the Mail, in particular handling features content.

He later helped lead New York-based video tech company TouchCast.

He also assisted a fashion start-up for Muslim women and was on the board of Free Word, an international centre for literature and literacy.

Paul battled the expansion of Sizewell nuclear power station near his home, writing in the Daily Mail: “This is about how big business can run roughshod over ordinary people like a bulldozer crushing farmland to make way for a new road.”

Paul, from Ipswich, lived in Suffolk and leaves wife Michaela and daughters Olivia, Amelie and Ruby.

Sunday Mirror editor Paul Henderson said: “I enjoyed the great privilege of working with Paul in London and New York. He’ll be remembered as a remarkably gifted journalist and a loyal friend.”