The Save Haslar Task Force and other hospital supporters have already succeeded in postponing its closure and are not giving up now – even though a decision has already been taken that the doors at Haslar will shut for good some time next year.

Control of the last-surviving military hospital in the UK, which dates back to 1753, was handed from the Ministry of Defence to Portsmouth Hospitals NHS Trust on March 31 last year.

The trust is expected to continue to use the facilities until late 2009, when the rebuilding of Queen Alexandra Hospital at Cosham is finished and services can be transferred there.

Chris Hill, organiser of Sunday's protest march, is not prepared to give in. He says: 'We're not protesting for what is right, which is to save Haslar, we're protesting for what is wrong and that's the closure of Haslar. We know the decision is wrong.'

Chris, a furniture salesman from Fareham, hopes that as many as 20,000 protesters will join the march through Gosport, starting at the Town Hall between 11.30am and noon and weaving its way along High Street to the waterfront and then up South Street back to the civic offices.

It was in December 1998 when the government first announced plans to close Haslar. But Chris says: 'It's not shut yet and until it is we won't stop. If something can be done to close it, something can be done to keep it open.'

Every MoD military hospital throughout the country closed when the government announced they did not give medical staff enough opportunities to develop their skills. Instead, special units were set up within NHS hospitals across the country to train staff.

But Chris does not support this policy. He says: 'No hospital other than Haslar has the facilities to look after military people and understand what they have been through.

'There have been many new houses and flats built in Gosport recently and we also need an accident and A&E department. Haslar could provide that.

'At the moment we have QA in Portsmouth and you would never get there in time.'

Chris organised a Save Haslar Hospital march last year and, with only a month's notice, rounded up 2,000 protesters who turned out in the pouring rain to support the campaign.

Now he wants to beat the numbers attracted to demonstrate way back in 1999 – when 22,000 people marched past the hospital gates in a bid to save it. It was the largest protest march in Gosport's history.
He explains: 'I could have washed my hands of it after the first protest, but I thought I have to give this one more go.

'I have done all this out of my own time and money. The only way the government will listen is to see what numbers of people will turn out to this march – there's power in numbers.'

QA spokeswoman Pat Forsyth said: 'We are very appreciative of our relationship with Royal Hospital Haslar. It's allowed us to keep our services going uninterrupted, but when the new hospital is finished we'll transfer all services back there.'

An MoD spokesman adds: 'The fact is that for many years Haslar has had nothing like the range of medical facilities and expertise that are found at a major trauma trust hospital such as Selly Oak in Birmingham. That is why Selly Oak Hospital now acts as the primary receiver of our overseas casualties.'