A MYSTERY good Samaritan and a social media storm have helped reunite a WWII digger with his lost medals.
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Maurice Dore, 90, discovered his medals were missing when he reached the corner of Dean and Olive streets about 9am today.
He had them at a service at St Patrick's Catholic Church in Smollett Street and lost them between there and the intersection as he walked along the Olive Street footpath.
Mr Dore's plea for help went viral on social media, with more than 60,000 people viewing a Border Mail Facebook post and almost 3000 people sharing a post by Prime television.
Tallangatta Secondary College student Charlie Star, 16, saw the Border Mail post and alerted readers to the fact that medals had been handed in to the RSL at Monument Hill.
"I heard a message over the microphone there," Charlie, of Granya, said.
A meeting was made and Mr Dore was reunited with his medals at the SS&A within three hours of their disappearance.
Mr Dore had a good feeling about finding his medals.
"I went to mass this morning so they've got to turn up," Mr Dore said before the discovery.
"I want them back because I earned them. They're not much good to anyone else and they're personal."
Mr Dore served in Australia in a Light Horse militia unit, then spent a year in New Guinea with the 9th Infantry Battalion before being involved in the conflict on Bougainville for another year.
