"On Saturday night, we will be placing cut out effigies of two soldiers, standing guard and lit up at night with solar lights," RSL Sub-Branch vice-president Don Briggs said.

"They're going to stand guard just for the occasion, Anzac Day and Remembrance Day, and then they'll be removed."

Read more: Your guide to ANZAC Day dawn services and marches across the Illawarra

This year, Warilla RSL Sub-Branch is also again placing Australian flags on each of the graves of ex-service people interred at Shellharbour Cemetery.

Mr Briggs said more than 200 ex-service people were buried in the cemetery.

"It's our aim to put a flag at each grave," he said.

"This is our third year of doing it, to show our appreciation for our service people."

Mr Briggs said during recent months they had learned that the unmarked grave of a World War I veteran, Private Christopher McCabe, was located at the Shellharbour Cemetery.

Mr Briggs said they were alerted to it by a relative of Mr McCabe.

"He was born in Shellharbour, served in World War I and is the only person in Shellharbour to receive the Military Medal for action at Péronne," Mr Briggs said.

Read more: Dapto High School students helping honour the memory of our local veterans

"He returned to Shellharbour, and died there (in 1980). We got his war records, we came looking and found it. It's a cross poked up against someone else's grave."

Mr Briggs said the Sub-Branch, Lions Club and Shellharbour Historical Society will be raising funds to purchase a headstone for Mr McCabe's grave.

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