Fifty years after a chance discovery during a trip to Gallipoli, a Hamilton couple has finally been able to solve their Anzac mystery.
In October 1968, Jan and Bruce Rosemergy bought an old Morris and travelled from London to Turkey, to visit Anzac Cove.
"I was walking along this beautiful stretch of beach and there was this piece protruding from the sand. So I picked it up and it appeared to be aluminium and had something written on it," Bruce recalls.
Bruce and Jan thought the tag, with the name "VW Murray", must have been on the luggage of an Australian or Kiwi soldier, so they took it home with them.
"We thought we'd pick it up and find the person somehow and get it back to the family," Jan says.
But that was easier said than done. Jan made calls to the New Zealand and Australian army, but had no luck. Then in the 1990s, Jan bought a home computer but her searches were also unsuccessful.
The tag sat in a draw at home for years, until last month, when Jan found it, and decided to put the name into a search engine.
"I went to the computer and typed it in and there he was on the Sydney Living Museum website!"
The site had done a write up about Vernon William Murray, of Wagga Wagga, New South Wales.
He was a trooper in the horse regiment and was shot and killed at 24 while sorting supplies near the beach.
There was also a photo of his cross, featuring a metal strip identical to the one the Rosemergys found.
"It was relief and it was excitement but mainly relief the tag had found its home," Jan says.
The tag has been sent to the Sydney Museum and the couple are now planning a trip to visit it on display.
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