The onslaught came in darkness early on May 19: some 42,000 Turks, in seemingly endless waves. When the survivors broke off and ran four hours later, the morning light revealed a no man's land covered with the dead and dying. The official war historian Charles Bean estimated that 10,000 of the enemy were killed or wounded. The casualties among the Australian and New Zealand soldiers he gave as 160 killed and 460 wounded, including the death in Shrapnel Gully of ambulance man Private John Simpson Kirkpatrick, known as the man with the donkey.

However, out of this terrible slaughter came one of the more remarkable episodes of the four years of fighting; a burial armistice that brought an understanding between Anzac and Turk that somehow defied the accepted mindset of men at war. This is the story of those extraordinary days, largely drawing on Herald archives for the words of the men who were there. Lance Corporal Clifford Mervyn Geddes, serving with the 3rd Battalion and a 28-year-old bank clerk living with his parents in Chatswood when he enlisted in 1914, was sleeping in full kit when the attack came. The thunderous gunfire brought him instantly to his feet.

"The word came for every man for whom there was room to line the front trench, and the Australians stood on the firing step shoulder to shoulder. "Along with others I was ordered to lie on the ground above the trench. When we climbed out a startling sight met our eyes. The darkness of No Man's Land was lit by the fire of blazing rifles from the grass, and the Turks were within 25 yards of our trenches.

"The orders of my particular group from Captain Austin, company commander, were that if the Turks got very close to jump across the trench and charge them with the bayonet, but on no account to fire our rifles and let them know we were there. "Thus I was a spectator of the most thrilling game I have ever seen. "The Australians were magnificent. Every man who could was firing across the trench at the line of fire from the dark ground as fast as he could pull the trigger and pull back the bolt to reload. When the rifle got too hot to hold, or jammed, the man below on the floor of the trench handed up his with more cartridges. The machine-guns poured back their hail of lead.

"Many of our grand chaps fell shot through the head, but immediately another man took the place of him who fell. "The dawn now began to break and what a sight lay before our eyes. It seemed as if an army lay asleep in the grass. So confident were the Turks that they attacked with blankets strapped to their backs, presumably to sleep the next night in our trenches, but the majority were sleeping their last sleep in No Man's Land. The remainder could stand the fire no longer, and raced back towards their own trenches.

"I was struck by the magnificent running of an athletic Turk, who ran like a deer for his own trench. Bullets threw up the dirt all around his feet, but on he sped and I really hoped that he might get there as he was such a wonderful runner. Just as he reached his own line and was about to jump into the trench an Australian bullet ended his great effort, and he rolled back down the slope in front of the banked-up earth." The day after the attack, an informal armistice was sought by the Turks, to bury the dead. Anzac headquarters replied that a formal armistice must be officially requested by an envoy. On May 21, a party of Turks approached the Australian right flank. There was some fire, but a Turkish officer who continued forward was blindfolded and led along the beach. This account is by Lieutenant-Colonel Arthur Wellesley Hyman, who was a solicitor in Tamworth when he enlisted, serving initially with the 7th Light Horse Regiment.

"The result was an extraordinary sight, because everyone in the trenches, realising that something unusual was happening, came rushing down the Anzac slopes to the beach till a passageway was formed, through which the Turkish officer, led by Majors Blamey and Glasfurd passed. "One of the regimental cooks on the right flank could not stand the strain and rushed at the Turkish officer with an axe, but he was quickly disarmed.

"The Turkish officer spent some time with General Birdwood arranging the terms of the armistice and finally it was settled that it should begin at 7.30am on the 24th of May and end at 4.30pm the same day. Red Cross flags were placed in front of the 3000 yards of Anzac frontlines, and the Turks carried out a similar plan, but they used Red Crescent flags. "It was a beautiful day, and exactly at 7.30am the Australians and the Turks began the work of burying the dead between the lines. The Australians had received orders not to go beyond the Red Cross flags and the Turks had received similar instructions as regards their flags, but it soon became apparent that neither side intended to strictly observe the arrangements, because each side fraternised at once, exchanging greetings and cigarettes and souvenirs. "The Anzac stretcher bearers, supervised by senior medical officers, undertook the work of burying the dead. All the rest of the AIF had been expressly forbidden to show their heads above the parapet of the trenches, as this would disclose our position to the Turks.

"Owing to the short distances between the front trenches it was impossible to see exactly how each line ran. The Turks, not realising this, soon after the armistice commenced sat in hundreds along their parapets, and disclosed their exact situation. It was hard to believe that so many thousands of men were opposed to us, whom we had not seen till that very moment. "During the operations a German threatened to hit a Turk with a spade for not working hard enough, and an Australian soldier, seeing this, immediately rushed up to hit the German who then slunk away.

"Many of the dead had fallen at the landing on the 25th of April and had been lying in the wheat fields in No Man's Land in the meantime. "The fate of many missing men was now cleared up for the first time. The task of both armies was a most arduous and difficult one, and full of the horrors of war. The wheat in the field was just coming to full ear, and interspersed with the wheat were red poppies. "At the precise hour the Anzacs began to pull down the Red Cross flags, but it was noticed that the Turks started to pull down theirs with reluctance and hesitation. The battle was then renewed with all its intensity."

Sergeant William Alfred Cross, a New Zealand-born chaplain serving with the 13th Battalion of the 4th Brigade, and the first clergyman in the AIF to win a Distinguished Conduct Medal, was one who noticed a changed attitude in the two sides after the amnesty. "While engaged burying the dead I came in contact with a number of Turks, one or two of whom could speak French, and I chatted to them while I had about 40 others around me. I found them decent fellows - simple country peasants, who had no grievances with anybody, and they regretted they had to come out and fight the English. We exchanged cigarettes and they lit ours.

"This better feeling continued. Once we had to beat a hasty retreat without looking to our dead. During that night the Turks crept up, covered over the dead with blankets, put blankets under the wounded, and dressed the wounds in many instances. "I never knew of a case where the Turk has acted unfairly. On the contrary, I have seen something approaching a reverence for our divine service. In burying the dead, I have been frequently under fire, but I have noticed that while we were engaged in a funeral service the Turks refrained from shooting in that direction." Sergeant Cross reported one more consequence: "Another aspect of the armistice was the great increase in the number of those we made prisoners. They feared the Australians before they knew us.

"I had charge of the prisoners at Imbros Island, 10 miles off, and they told me they did not want to get back." This increase in Turkish surrenders caused congestion problems in the limited space at Anzac Cove as they built up awaiting transfer.

Random, and probably non-regulation, acts of kindness sometimes went astray because of this changed attitude. Corporal Howard McKern, 4th Battalion, wrote to his mother in Mosman: "The other day we tried to liberate a couple of Turkish prisoners. We wanted them to escape back into their own lines and let their countrymen know how well we had treated them. But they weren't having any of this. They would not take the 'off-ee' to run away whilst we were not looking, and then our fellows walked them through the bush and tried to lose them. "They thought they had done this all right, but judge of their astonishment when they got back and were about to report their success, to find the two Turks following after them, each carrying a billet of firewood."