Wilfred Vivian Hubert Luther BIDSTRUP

Wilfred 'Luther' Bidstrup was born on 13 May 1889 in Mitiamo, Victoria. His parents were Robert Ipsen and Minna Louise (née Schilling) Bidstrup. He attended Scotch from 1903 to 1904.

Luther was an accountant when he enlisted on 28 May 1915 at Keswick, South Australia. He served in the 50th Battalion with the rank of Lieutenant.

Luther died on 3 April 1917 at Noreuil, France. He was 27 years of age.

Service record

Before enlisting, Luther had been an Acting Sergeant in the Victorian Rifles militia unit for more than two years. After enlisting for the AIF in South Australia in 1915, Luther was allocated to reinforcements to the Medical Corps and then successively to no fewer than four infantry battalions. His leadership potential must have been apparent, for in October 1915 he was sent to an NCO school and then in March 1916 to Officer School at Duntroon. On 10 May 1916 he received his commission as a 2nd Lieutenant and was assigned to reinforcements for the 43rd Battalion.

He embarked for overseas in August 1916, arriving in England at the end of September and then reaching France on 23 October. The following month he was transferred to the 50th Battalion. On 19 February 1917 he was promoted to full Lieutenant. On 3 April he was reported ‘Missing in Action’ but two days later this was altered to ‘Killed in Action’. A Red Cross Wounded and Missing file contains several accounts of his death from men in his company. Several noted that he was a ‘bomber officer’; that is, the officer in charge of men using ‘bombs’, or grenades. One man saw him lying dead with his revolver beside him the following day, with all the cartridges fired off. James Churchill Smith, a fellow officer of the 50th Battalion, wrote that Luther had been killed ‘by a Boche Machine Gun whilst advancing to the attack.’ Other accounts stated too that it had been machine gun fire that killed him. ‘His platoon’, Smith continued, ‘met a German strong-point and had a bad time.’

A more recent account says he was killed while his platoon mopped up after the battalion’s first wave advanced into Noreuil. The official historian notes that Bidstrup was killed ‘after emptying his revolver into the Germans’. In his last letter home before departing for the front, he told his mother that his motto would be ‘Death before dishonour’. His widowed mother ordered the following words put on his headstone: 

‘No life is lost
That’s nobly spent
No hero’s death is premature
Mother’

Luther Bidstrup is buried in the Noreuil Australian Cemetery (Row F, Grave No. 39), France.

Sources:

1. Australian War Memorial – Roll of Honour & Red Cross Wounded and Missing file & ‘Last Post ceremony commemorating the service of Lieutenant Wilfred Vivian Hubert Luther Bidstrup’
2. Bean, CEW, Official History of Australia in the War of 1914–1918, vol. IV, University of Queensland Press and Australian War Memorial, St Lucia, 1982, p. 213
3. Mishura Scotch Database
4. National Archives of Australia – B2455, BIDSTRUP W V H L
5. Scotch Collegian 1917
6. The AIF Project - https://www.aif.adfa.edu.au/showPerson?pid=22337