TRIBUTES will be paid next week to a man who rose to the top of the Ministry of Defence in London and worked at Westminster Abbey.

Michael Moss, 77, was born in Church and brought up in Dill Hall Lane by parents, Ernest and Mary.

After attending Accrington Grammar School, he gained an scholarship to study maths at King’s College, Cambridge.

Rising to Flight Lieutenant in the RAF on National Service, he then joined the Air Ministry in 1960, moving to the Ministry of Defence in 1964.

He moved to the highest levels of the civil service and was awarded the Companion of the Order of the Bath by the Queen in 1996.

In the same year, he became a steward and guide at Westminster Abbey and, from 1968 to 2000, sang in the choir of St Bartholomew the Great, Smithfield in London.

Mr Moss, an only child and bachelor, had six godchildren and passed away last week after illness.

There will be a requiem service in St Faith’s Chapel at Westminster Abbey on Tuesday, followed by a funeral at St Bartholomew the Great and a gathering at Haberdasher’s Hall in the City of London.

Mr Moss will be buried after a service at Accrington Cemetery on Wednesday, September 4.

Lifelong friend Norman Pilkington, who will give the eulogy at St Bartholomew’s, said: “My wife Margaret and I will miss Michael greatly. He was always a real high-flyer.

“Not many young men from Accrington rise to the top of the Ministry of Defence and get to be a Companion of the Order of the Bath. We were close friends at school then lost touch until we met again in retirement.

“He was the same warm, friendly and dryly amusing man he had been as a youngster.”

Westminster Abbey Receiver General Sir Stephen Lamport said: “Michael loved travel. He was a fine singer and a good musician. He was devoted to his six godchildren, the ‘family’ as he referred to them.”