The veteran BBC foreign correspondent Sir Charles Wheeler died yesterday aged 85. He had lung cancer.

Wheeler made his name while in Delhi covering the Dalai Lama’s flight from Tibet in 1959. He was the BBC’s chief US correspondent from 1969 to 1973, when he became Europe correspondent. He also worked for Newsnight for 15 years and was a Panorama producer.

The BBC’s longest-serving foreign correspondent, he was knighted in 2006. He began his career as a copyboy on the Daily Sketch in 1939 and served undercover in Germany for the Marines’ naval intelligence unit. After the war he joined the BBC World Service.

Mark Thompson, the BBC Director General, described Wheeler as “utterly irreplaceable”. He added: “To audiences and to his colleagues alike, Charles Wheeler was simply a legend. I am privileged to have worked with him.”

Mark Damazer, the Radio 4 Controller, said: “Charles Wheeler embodied all that is best in the BBC’s journalism. Everything he did was shot through with his compassion and wisdom. He was magnificent.”

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