大象传媒

Written on behalf of Paul Leaney by Billingshurst Library.

Horsham and Guildford Railway, train bombed and machine gunned.

Marguerite Kathleen Leaney, nee Bacon _ a very brave lady.

She was born at Lurgashall, West Sussex in 1915, the daughter of Mr and Mrs Bacon. Mr Bacon was a teacher and a few years later moved to Rudgwick on his appointment as headmaster.
She had an independent nature, and unusually for that time, chose to leave home at age 15 or 16 to learn the art of floristry in London, which she did under the expert tuition of Constance Spry. She worked at the Cavendish arranging and selling flowers to wealthy clients under the management of the lady who in more recent times was featured in the TV series Duchess of Duke Street. She was frequently driven to Covent Garden by Daimler to buy the stock, and often returned on foot to exercise the pampered pooches of the rich and famous. She often returned to Rugwick to visit her parents, and later when she moved back into the area chose to ride a motor bike and sidecar.
In 1940 she married Trevor Leaney, a teacher at Christs Hospital and they moved to Horsham. When he was drafted into the army she moved back in with her parents at the school masters house at Bucks Green, where her son Paul was born in 1942.
On December 16th 1942, she travelled by train to Farnborough, where her husband was on standby with the Tank Corps for embarkation to North Africa, and had not seen their ten week old son. On her return journey from Guildford that afternoon, a lone Dornier 217 Bomber descended from the clouds looking for an opportunist target as the train was approaching Bramley Station. It was bombed and starfed by machine guns, killing seven and injuring many more. The raider was shortly afterwards persued by a Beaufighter over the coast and crashed into a gasometer at Bognor killing the four crew members.
Kathleen Leaney & Rita as she preferred to be called was struck in the side of the face by a bullet which shattered her jaw bone and exited from the opposite temple taking out an eye. She also had deep penetration wounds from the glass from the shattered windows. Her son Paul also had glass wounds and she remembered passing him down form the wrecked carriage to a Canadian soldier who helped her on foot along to the station.
She was taken to Park Prewitt Hospital at Basingstoke, where she found herself laying in a dingy cell with a small barred window that was made to house 19th century lunatics.
She was later transferred to East Grinstead for operations by Alexander Macindoe, the celebrated plastic surgeon. This was followed by a long period of convalescence at Shoreham. Paul was looked after by grandparents for 2 years at Rudgwick.
She was very philosophical about her fate and didnt blame anyone, considering herself lucky: the woman who had been next to her on the train was killed, and she remembered the other patients at East Grinstead mostly burnt airmen who had lost their faces and their eyesight and still kept a sense of humour. Before telling a joke the question would be asked & are there any women about?
In 1949 she opened & The Flower Box on Horsham Station and later kept a flower shop in Carfax until 1962. her husband died in 1957. Later after moving to Billingshurst she opened The Flower Box Shop there.
She underwent operations on her face throughout her life as techniques improved, but also to remove pieces of glass as they made their presence felt.

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