Three former French Foreign Legionnaires have ended up working together at the same Sussex watering hole.

Rik Cowlard, Dean Huish and Glynn Ford's days in the Legion were a world away from Bar Med in Western Road, Hove.

But they reckon the discipline drilled into them during their time in the famous force helps keep the house in order.

Glynn, operations manager of all the Bar Meds in the South, said: "You have to be tough running a bar, which anyone is after spending time in the legion. You also know a legionnaire will do something when you ask them to because they are used to taking orders and certainly get the job done."

As new recruits in the Legion in 1985, Welshmen Dean and Glynn stuck together as the trainers put them through their paces.

The pair, both from Cardiff, spent four months at a camp in southern France before being assigned to opposite sides of the world.

Glynn, now 40, said: "It was tough and you had to understand French so you could obey orders. If you didn't understand you ended up getting a clout across the head."

Glynn stayed in France to train new recruits while Dean was sent to Guyana, South America, to guard a secret space rocket site in the jungle.

They did not see each other again until Dean walked into Glynn's bar in Cardiff by chance 13 years later.

They caught up on old times and Glynn offered Dean a job with Bar Med. Dean finally accepted the offer early this year and moved to become general manager of the Hove branch in August.

Dean, 39, and Glynn soon drafted in a new security manager Rik Cowlard, who lives in Eastbourne, not realising at first that he too was a former legionnaire.

Rik, 31, who served as a military policeman in the Gulf and spent four years as a paratrooper in the legion, said: "I had missiles thrown at me in the Gulf, so this is child's play.

"It can be hard for a soldier to adjust to civvy street so it is good to have Dean and Glynn around."

During the rare times they get together the trio often end up reminiscing about old legion names and places.

Livia Brynin, who helps Dean manage Bar Med in Hove, said: "I'm always being told stories about Dean wrestling snakes in the jungle and life in the legion. They may look tough, but you couldn't meet three nicer men."