Places features

The house is funded by the Poppy Appeal

For service men and women across the country, Somerset Legion House is a haven of a retreat.

Overlooking Weston-super-Mare's seafront and opened a year ago by the Duke of Kent, guests have said the house is better than a "five-star hotel".

Anyone who has served in the armed forces as well as their dependants are eligible to stay there, all free of charge. It is hard to ascertain how much exactly it costs per person to stay there, but all of it is met by the Legion's Poppy Appeal.

"This is a marvelous time for us. You don't realise how much we appreciate what we're getting here. It's even better than a five star hotel because they're catering for people who are getting onto 90-odd and we need looking after," said George Young, 87, who was a POW held in Singapore in WWII.

There has to be a need for that break - it could be following an illness, operation, bereavement, flood, fire etc.

Julie Salisbury, fundraising officer at the Legion House, said: "Somerset Legion House is (virtually) a hotel for ex-service or serving members of the community to come here for a fortnight's break."

It is situated on Weston's seafront

Costing £6.7m to build, the house has 47 rooms, catering for 75 people. Since it opened in October 2007, about 1,200 people have stayed.

Although guests are mainly aged in their 70s and 80s, those who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan have also stayed along with their families in the summer holidays. The house caters for all ages however they do not have care staff.

"It is good for them (service personnel) to go to a place where there are other people who know what they are going through," said Julie.

"Younger servicemen have different problems to what the older ones do. The older generation love to talk about it but for the younger generation, the experience is so fresh in their minds that they can't bring themselves to talk about it."

A statement which 89-year-old Fergus Anckorn, who was held in Singapore as a prisoner of war during WWII, agrees with.

"It's rather nice to come to a place like this because you meet people you haven't seen before and you start chatting and you realise you were in the same places out there or you knew of people who were with them," he said.

It has 47 rooms

"I was here talking to a fellow who was on the Prince of Wales when it was sunk and one of his shipmates - there wasn't many of them - was in one of the camps that I was in so we had a lovely chat about all that.

"And that's what we do. We chew the fat on all those things which happened so long ago."

The house is the largest of four such 'hotels' which the Royal Legion look after. The other three are based in Bridlington, Southport and in Northern Ireland.

The legion decided to build the house as the previous facility, the Break Centre, was an old Victorian property which needed vast alterations to make it disable-friendly so it was more economic to build one from scratch.

The new building means they do not have to turn away anyone anymore.