A FORMER Essex University academic with a passion for Russia has died following complications after a knee replacement operation.

Terry Culhane helped lay the foundations for Essex University's Department of Language and Linguistics.

In May, he went into hospital for a knee replacement operation, but his new joint became infected, leading to sepsis.

He died from multiple organ failure on July 28, aged 81.

Mr Culhane was a linguist and Russian specialist and joined the university in 1965, a year after it opened.

He originally worked in its language centre, which became the Department of Language and Linguistics in 1974.

Mr Culhane published several papers on applied linguistics – particularly language testing – and taught on the university's MA course.

He was a visiting lecturer for the British Council, giving talks in Botswana, Kenya and Canada, but Russian was his first love.

His work included collaborating with Essex colleagues on a major research project on contemporary written and spoken Russian.

In collaboration with colleague Paddy O’Toole, Mr Culhane published the Russian courses, Passport to Moscow and Passport to Odessa.

In 1980 he wrote the BBC self instruction course, Russian Language and People.

The course was accompanied by a series of BBC TV programmes and Mr Culhane was on location in Moscow with the BBC as the course adviser.

One of his stories of that time was of series presenter Chris Serle taking photos of the Kremlin, in Red Square, and being arrested.

In 1995, with the significant changes which had occurred in the former Soviet Union, the BBC asked Mr Culhane to update the course and he did so with the collaboration of Dr Roy Bivon, another colleague within the Department of Language and Linguistics.

Mr Culhane also co-wrote an English self-instruction course for foreigners with Jean-Paul Chartier – English Alone or L’Anglais Chez Soi.

He was Proctor of the University in the Seventies, during a turbulent time of student protests.

Stories he told from this time included having a bucket of water thrown over him and having to lock himself in Wivenhoe House to prevent striking miners and students entering the building.

Mr Culhane, born in Leeds, did National Service in the RAF and was a member of the Joint Services School for Linguists where he learnt Russian.

He subsequently did a Russian degree at Leeds University and became a school teacher.

He moved to Colchester to teach Russian at the university in 1965 and spent the rest of his career there, taking early retirement in 1987.

Mr Culhane played golf at Colchester Golf Club and his enthusiasm for the sport led to him designing a golf-based board game.

He was involved with the university golf club and from the Eighties until 2004, he organised the Clacton Cup competition.

He was also a member of the North Countrymen’s Club in Colchester and chairman of Project Horizon, a charity for the mentally handicapped at Turner Village.

Mr Culhane had three children, by his first marriage. He met his second wife, Jo, in 1980.

The funeral was held today at Saint Teresa's Catholic Church, Lexden, followed by a committal service at Colchester Crematorium