He sang in the first broadcast Christmas Eve carol service from King’s College Chapel in 1928, and continued to sing in a church choir throughout his life.

The children of David and Mary Briggs are Johnny, who farms in Wales, Andrew, Professor of Nanomaterials at Oxford, Catherine, a teacher of the visually impaired, and Anne Atkins, novelist, writer and broadcaster.

The threat was withdrawn after the order was found to be against the Geneva Convention, and for the rest of the war he continued as a corporal, being ineligible for promotion or decoration as a conscientious objector.

[8] In 1959, following a short hiatus, Briggs succeeded Donald George Butters[9] as Headmaster of King's College School, Cambridge, a position he held until his retirement in 1977.

[11] After returning to Cambridge he became a close friend of conductor, organist and composer Sir David Willcocks,[12] and of church historian The Revd Professor Owen Chadwick.