Tributes to Ron Allison at thanksgiving service

They included the Queen for whom Chronicle columnist Ron worked in the 1970s.

The monarch wrote to Ron's widow Jennifer: "I was so very sorry to learn of Ron’s death. I greatly valued his service to me and members of my family whilst he was Press Secretary and send you and members of his family my heartfelt condolences in your great loss”.

More than 200 people attended the service at St Cross Chapel. Ron, who started his journalism career as a junior reporter on the Chronicle in the 1950s, died on July 26, aged 90.

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Paying tribute John Dauth, who worked in the Buckingham Palace press office with Ron, said: "I know from my own personal experience how much the Royal Family valued Ron’s clear, calm and sensible advice and support including I remember once during the astonishing Silver Jubilee year, telling the Queen that it would help a lot if she smiled a bit more! something, like so much else, she has become remarkable adept at doing."

Mr Dauth added: "Hugo Vickers, the great Royal writer, with us today, has written an excellent obituary in the Telegraph - one of many - and I commend it to you. He chronicles Ron’s remarkable career through its many iterations but my memories of him are not of his many achievements - at the Palace, the BBC, ITV and elsewhere, my memories of him are of his kindness, calmness and unfailing support. I will always be grateful for that."

He also relayed a message from one of Ron's successors, Charles Anson: "Ron Allison was a treasured friend and colleague during my time as Press Secretary and since then too, with some jolly lunches along the way. There was a posse of former Palace Press Secretaries, such as Michael Shea, Bill Heseltine, Robin Janvrin and especially Ron, who were always willing to give advice if asked, plus, of course, to offer invaluable moral supporting troubled times and, as Annus Horribilus happened on my watch during the difficult period 1992-97, with the difficulties in several Royal marriages, Royal tax issues and the fire at Windsor, there were times when a frank and friendly chat with a fellow Press Secretary was both invaluable and also a real fillip to the spirits."

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The service included three hymns - O God, our help in ages past, Abide with me and Praise, my soul, the King of Heaven. Derek Beck played the organ.

The address was given by Rev Canon David Richards. After the service on Thursday the service goers gathered at the nearby Bell Inn.