Battles honoured

Last campaigns of WWI at the centre of Anzac Day tributes

THE final campaigns of World War I will be the focus of Anzac Day commemorations across Australia.

This year marks the centenary of the last battles which led to the Armistice being declared in November 1918.

At the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, excerpts from letters and diaries of WWI soldiers will be read ahead of the dawn service.

Acting Prime Minister Michael McCormack will attend, while Malcolm Turnbull takes part in the centenary of the Battle of Villers-Bretonneux dawn service in France.

The Villers-Bretonneux event will mark the day 100 years ago when the Australian 13th and 15th brigades successfully retook the village from German forces in a surprise night attack.

“In 2018 we mark the centenary of the end of the First World War, the war to end all wars,” Mr Turnbull said.

Mr Turnbull called it one of Australia’s most remarkable military feats, that “turned the tide of that terrible war”.

On Tuesday, the prime minister, his predecessor Tony Abbott and Defence Minister Marise Payne will attend the opening of the Sir John Monash Centre at Villers-Bretonneux. As well, a new statue of Monash will be placed in the grounds of the Australian War Memorial.

The Prince of Wales and the prime minister of France, Edouard Philippe, will join the Australian dignitaries at the dawn service on Wednesday.

Prince Charles will deliver a reading and lay a wreath at the service.

In Australia, the national march will be led this year by the Army Apprentices and the Last Post ceremony at the AWM will focus on the story of WWI officer, Lieutenant Ralph Elsmere Claridge, from the 50th Australian Infantry Battalion. Adelaide-born Claridge died on April 25, 1918, in France aged 25.

He is remembered at the Villers-Bretonneux Memorial.