PANEL 4

TURKISH COUNTER-ATTACK

It was not hard to decide that one of the ten panels should be given over to the story of the Turkish counter-attack at Anzac on 19 May 1915. Up until this momentous effort by the Turks to drive the enemy into the sea, the Anzacs had thought the Turks were using so-called ‘explosive bullets’ which caused terrible wounds. After the Turkish attack, the Australians realised, as they could see hundreds of enemy dead in front of their trenches, that their own machine guns and rifles also caused terrible wounds. Charles Bean wrote of the changed attitude towards the Turkish soldiers after 19 May:

After the terrible punishment inflicted upon the brave but futile assaults all bitterness faded … The Turks displayed an admirable manliness … From that morning onwards the attitude of the Anzac troops towards the individual Turks was rather that of opponents in a friendly game.

[Charles Bean, The Story of Anzac, Vol II, Sydney, 1924, p.162]