‘Enormously proud’: missing soldiers return to families

By: Lucinda Garbutt-Young, Jennifer Dudley-Nicholson and Annika Rhoades

The spirit of Remembrance Day will be felt throughout the country, particularly for those who have now learned the fate of relatives.

Across Australia, 11 families have been given closure about what happened to their relatives across battlegrounds more than a century ago.

The soldiers from World War I, all of whom added to the 30,000 count of missing in action Anzacs, have now been formally identified.

Among them is Defence Minister Richard Marles’ great-uncle, Lieutenant Andrew Anderson, who survived major battles such as Pozieres, Mouquet Farm and Bullecourt, before he was killed during the Battle of Menin Road, near Ypres, in 1917. He was just 19 when he enlisted.

“I feel enormously proud of him, of his service, and the fact that we can remember him in this way,” Mr Marles told ABC TV of his relative.

A handful of Australian soldiers are identified in international efforts each year through a painstaking DNA and fact-matching process. Much of the work is done in Scotland.

On November 11, people nationwide will attend services honouring those who served their country in all wars and armed conflicts, stopping for a minute’s silence at 11am.

It marks 108 years since the armistice that ended four years of continuous warfare on Europe’s Western Front, the main battleground of World War I, where more than 60,000 Australians died.

For many of today’s soldiers, following in family footsteps by joining the military was something they felt called to do, despite the sacrifices they had witnessed.

That was the case for veteran Brad Copelin, who told AAP he was “programmed” to follow after his father and grandfather.

Having served nearly 25 years in the Australian Army, including deployments to Afghanistan and the Solomon Islands, the 56-year-old believes the spirit of Remembrance Day should extend beyond an annual pause.

“Remembrance Day brings up a lot of memories,” Mr Copelin said.

“As much as we have some really great memories from our service, and some really great people that we worked with … there’s also the negative memories of our service that we will carry with us all the time.”

Mr Copelin never had any intention of doing anything other than continuing the family legacy and received his parents’ permission to enlist aged 17.

His father had been in the navy on HMAS Melbourne when it crashed with the USS Frank E Evans, cutting it in two.

It was not until after Mr Copelin enlisted that his grandfather, a Japanese prisoner of war on the Burma railway, began telling his grandson of his experience.

“He never spoke about the war to anyone,” said the veteran, who has a tattoo of a red poppy on his arm.

The president of the Engadine RSL sub-branch, in Sydney’s south, he aims to help fellow veterans and their families know they are not alone in their struggles.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese paid tribute to Australia’s soldiers while in Singapore, using a stopover on his journey to the United Nations climate talks to mark the event.

He laid a wreath at the Changi Chapel and Museum early on Wednesday, joined by Australia’s Singapore High Commissioner Robyn Mudie.

The museum tells the stories of some of the 90,000 prisoners of war and civilians interned in Changi during the Japanese occupation of Singapore in World War II.

“The 15,000 Australians who were interned here in Changi represent the best of the Australian character – they showed courage, selflessness, sacrifice and mateship,” Mr Albanese said.

Closer to home, Remembrance Day in 2026 coincides with the opening of the Australian War Memorial 85 years ago in the nation’s capital in 1941, where a major event will occur.

Governor-General Sam Mostyn will lay a scarlet poppy wreath, first laid in 1934 on the memorial’s construction site, to symbolise the continuity of tradition, and many military leaders will be in attendance.