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Ingrams, former editor of Private Eye, founded The Oldie in 1992 as a magazine aimed at, well, the older reader. In doing so, he was ridiculed by many fellow journalists. Legendary columnist Nigel Dempster wrote: "To me, The Oldie is the ultimate conceit and folly of Richard Ingrams. His day, as proved by this silly venture, is over." But others rallied to the cause, including W F Deedes, late of this parish, who recognised a gap in the market. "Each generation is left out of step with the previous generation. With this generation, the gap is the widest because of the speed of change, due to science and technology. We also have fashion cults moving at bewildering speed, with the sense of cultural isolation for the old."

Over the years, Ingrams attracted a stellar cast, from Auberon Waugh to Beryl Bainbridge, Joan Bakewell and Jilly Cooper, Sir Terry Wogan, John Sweeney and Patrick Cockburn. But after 22 years in the job, he resigned last month following a flaming row with the magazine's publisher, James Pembroke. In a newspaper article announcing his departure, Ingrams cited the onset of corporate culture and the threat of a "disciplinary warning" as the reasons for his decision.

In characteristic Ingrams style, he wrote that "alarm bells started to ring some time ago when [Pembroke] began to hanker after 'brainstorming sessions' and covered the office walls with charts showing blue and yellow days for different members of staff".

The two men have differing views on what caused the argument and, to the casual observer, it seems a touch parochial. According to Ingrams, it began earlier this year when Pembroke applied for a £15,000 grant from the Arts Council to support the Soho Literary Festival, run in conjunction with The Oldie.

Ingrams maintains that Pembroke's application contained a misleading statement that the Soho Literary Festival was an "arts organisation", when it is in fact run by Oldie Publications. He was also worried that the money was supposed to go on a "new marketing executive salary" when it allegedly went to the magazine's existing editorial assistant. Ingrams was concerned that, as the magazine's editor, this would lead to bad publicity.

"I've had run-ins with Pembroke for some time," Ingrams says. "But it came to a head with the Arts Council grant he extracted to organise the Soho Literary Festival. He was spinning them a yarn about wanting to employ a new marketing executive. I made a stink about that – and people said I was pursuing a vendetta.

"James then asked me to come to a meeting to discuss the fall in newsstand sales. I didn't see the point. And then I was summoned to this disciplinary meeting. I was told I could bring a trade union representative, and I was asked whether I suffered from disabilities. It all seemed mad."

Pembroke has a different version of events.

"I'm surprised by him saying he resigned because of the Arts Council grant for the Soho Literary Festival,'' he says. "Before, he claimed it was because I was 'impossible to work with'.

"I joined The Oldie in 1992. Richard has always been a massive inspiration, and I am very grateful for all he has done for me. I have always thought he is the greatest post-war editor, and can claim to have had the greatest impact on journalism in the last 50 years. The Oldie was a brainwave, and demonstrated his extraordinary ability to excel in the arenas of both investigative journalism and general features."

The irony is that, in 2007, Pembroke did much to save the magazine when it was in trouble. In the past seven years, since he took over, circulation has grown year-on-year by 10 per cent. It was 24,000 in 2007, but now stands at 44,555, and the magazine makes a healthy profit. This is quite a contrast from its early days, when the publisher, Naim Attallah, heavily subsidised the publication. The late Sir Paul Getty took over ownership and continued to subsidise it until his son, Mark Getty, sold it to a conglomerate that included Pembroke.

"It was I who, in 1994, convinced Naim Attallah, the owner, to reopen the magazine after it had closed," Pembroke says. "Richard has always credited me in print with saving The Oldie, which is why he asked Mark Getty not to sell the magazine to another company but to me. He knew I would give him total freedom, as Peter Cook [gave Ingrams] on Private Eye.

"I have never interfered with the content of the magazine, except to introduce the Oldie Review of Books, which Richard then asked me to edit. On the contrary, he has always had my full support. I have more than doubled the contributors' bill since we bought the company in 2007."

He points out that Ingrams has just accepted a very handsome offer for the shares Pembroke gave him when he bought The Oldie. ''The Oldie staff and the vast majority of the contributors are pushing ahead and intend to maintain the high quality of the magazine."

As for the accusations over the Arts Council grant, Pembroke says that the event is eligible for funding and a legitimate recipient of a grant. ''I have not made any misleading statements to the Arts Council. Richard did not resign because of this but due to the deterioration in our relationship that started in 2012."

As for Chancellor, who starts in The Oldie's small, open plan office in Fitzrovia next week, he is planning no new radical departures for the magazine.

"I want to keep the sacred flame burning," he says. "I'll take it slowly, and tweak it here and there."

He has history with the magazine and was one of its initial backers, even devising its first masthead symbol – the elderly couple usually depicted on road signs, hobbling across a road with the aid of a stick.

Ingrams, meanwhile, insists he has no plans to start another magazine. "The Oldie's been going for 22 years; very few magazines last that long," he says. Instead, he will now devote his time to finishing his biography of the broadcaster and justice campaigner Ludovic Kennedy, at his home in Berkshire.

Ingrams may have left Fleet Street, but he hasn't laid down his pen.