Generations of service honoured on Remembrance Day

Résumé détaillé

The spirit of Remembrance Day should be much more than pausing once a year to mark those who have served their country, a veteran of nearly 25 years says.

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.

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