FROM OUT OF THE DARKNESS
CAME HIS LOVING VOICE

BOMBARDIER LIONEL ROWLAND BIDWELL

ROYAL FIELD ARTILLERY

22ND OCTOBER 1918 AGE 23

BURIED: ROISEL COMMUNAL CEMETERY EXTENSION, FRANCE


Whose loving voice? Has God's loving voice spoken to Lionel Bidwell's parents through the darkness of their grief, or have they heard their son's voice at a spiritualist seance? Much as I like the idea of the latter I feel it's probably the former. The inscription is not a direct quote but it's based on the sort of idea found in this evangelist hymn:

Hark! there comes a whisper
Stealing on your ear;
Tis the Saviour calling,
Soft, soft and clear:

With that voice so gentle,
Do you hear him say?
Tell Me all your sorrows;
Come, come away!

At the cross of Jesus
Let your burden fall,
While He gently whispers:
I'll bear it all.

Lionel Bidwell was a twenty-three-year-old nursery gardener from Preston in Lancashire