A veteran who died overnight has had a special farewell at this morning's dawn service in Auckland.

The soldier's family took his casket with them, and placed it at the Weeping Wall in Auckland Domain.

Vietnam veteran Eddie Knock said he joined the army as a 15-year-old and served alongside the soldier.

 "We had something different here, one of the veterans died overnight and his family brought the casket up. It was down by the Weeping Wall this morning. It was quite good for the family to do that. It was quite good to be associated with that happening."

He said didn't know him as "he would have been out of the army before I came along."

"He was in my unit, 161 battery. I'd heard of him. New Zealand's only a very small army, and we're like family, we know each other, we swap from one unit to another.

"I didn't go over to the last lot of gunners to Vietnam and he was in one of the early lots. There was about a five-year difference."