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A 100-year-old was among the veterans across Australia and New Zealand who held vigils on driveways to mark Anzac Day in lockdown.
Thousands turned out in isolation on their streets, balconies and gardens under candlelight while listening to The Last Post and bugles to remember the nations’ war dead.
The annual event commemorates the 10,000 soldiers from the two nations who perished in the 1915 Gallipoli landings during the First World War.
But this year, for the first time in more than a century since the Spanish flu broke out in 1918, marches and gatherings were cancelled.
Tom Newby, 100, paid his respects at a drive-by parade alongside family and friends at the RAAFA Air Force Memorial Estate care home facility, Perth, where he lives.
Tom Newby, 100, stands to attention Getty Images“It means a damn lot, it means what I did in the war was worth it,” he told Perth Now.
Ron Hermanns, Australia’s oldest living WW1 veteran at 108, sat quietly with families and friends in his driveway with his medals wrapped around his neck.
"I think we should do something to remember the men who lost their lives," he said.
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In Canberra, the Australian capital, Prime Minister Scott Morrison spoke at a crowd-free commemorative service inside the Australian War Memorial.
In the Sydney suburb of Wahroonga, eight-year-old trumpeter Lewis Ketteridge and French horn player Grace Colville, 16, were among a dozen brass players playing The Last Post from their driveways at dawn before 40 residents observed a minute’s silence.
Aussies and Kiwis paid their respects at dawn from their driveways and balconiesGetty ImagesResident Catherine Colville said the community followed social distancing as they placed candles, pictures of serving ancestors and wreaths of native leaves and flowers under an Australian flag hanging on a tree.
In New Zealand, where even tighter crowd restrictions are in place, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern stood at dawn on the driveway of Premier House, the leader’s official residence, for a ceremony.
Thousands across the country participated in the “Stand at Dawn” initiative, and in one Christchurch suburb, bagpiper Tom Glover greeted the families that gathered at each driveway with a rendition of Amazing Grace.
The Lone Pine Cemetery memorial for the First World War Gallipoli landings in TurkeyPAIn Britain, the annual Westminster Abbey service for Anzac Day was cancelled.
Meanwhile in Canakkale, Turkey, the site of the Gallipoli landing, three local tourism guides placed red flowers at the Anzac Cove memorial after hundreds were forced to cancel their traditional trip to the site.