Harry Patch has enjoyed a long association with the Legion but it was recently discovered that he had never officially signed up.

So the veterans’ charity has made him a lifetime member and will honour him with an award.

He said: “There are a few things coming up and I am quite busy. But I don’t feel my age –  I feel 50.”

Britain’s oldest survivor of the trenches in the First World War was conscripted into the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry as a gunner at the age of 19.

He was badly injured at Ypres in Belgium and saw his three best friends get killed.

Mr Patch, of Wells, Somerset, served in the Auxiliary Fire Service in the Second World War.