In Leamington, this band of soldiers has dwindled over the years from 52 to eight, but they still meet every month and sometimes talk about their experiences of fighting the Japanese during the Second World War.

One of their number, 84-year-old William Marland, has been the group's standard bearer since it formed 37 years ago and has just been commended for his efforts.

He spent a year and three months in the jungles of north Burma and has written a book The Grand Tour about his life and those "hellish days".

Born to a family of 11, Mr Marland joined the army at 16 and after seeing action in Madagascar, went to Burma in 1944 with a Royal Scots regiment.

With little or no training in jungle combat or survival, the troops were thrown in at the deep end and on top of that had monsoon rains and a myriad of insect-related illnesses to deal with.

Mr Marland said: "You had to be on your mettle when on a patrol. We communicated with hand signals. You soon found out where the Japanese were when you are fired on.

"But we had another enemy just as brutal - mother nature. It would rain up to eight inches a day and you would be soaked through and end up with foot rot.

"Everything that moved was after your blood. Thirstiest of them all were the leeches. Their target was anywhere there was an opening in your battledress.

"You couldn't pull them off because their jaws would stay in your skin so you had to burn them off with a cigarette."

Mr Marland was also the victim of a 12-inch guinea worm picked up in East Africa, ringworm, scrub-typhus and malaria - a disease that can still flare up today.

Food during the war consisted mainly of hard biscuits mixed up with a tin of bully-beef - the same food that Mr Marland's father ate during the First World War - but he has fond memories of enjoying "good old bully-beef stew" when it was available.

Combat in the jungle was vicious with a "fanatical" enemy that "took no prisoners".

And on one occasion, after days of shelling and gunfire, Mr Marland recalls discovering it was only after the fight that its brutality became clear.

He said: "We had crossed a small stream and up a bank - then it hit you, the sheer savagery of the battle.

"There were the bodies of brave comrades who had died in the sun four days ago.