So it came as a shock to the humble Mittagong woman when police from the Hume Local Area Command (LAC) decided to change hers.

Margaret was awarded a Queen’s Gallantry Medal for “exemplary acts of bravery” for her incredible role as a first responder to the Granville rail disaster in 1977 – but in 2008, her medal was stolen.

Issued for her outstanding contributions at the crash that claimed 83 lives and injured more than 200 people, Margaret doubted she’d ever see the medal again.

“She was there for more than 12 hours, she wore down the tops of her shoes trying to attend to everyone trapped. She refused to leave,” Cherylin Cole, Margaret’s cousin, said.

Sergeant Kerry-Lyn Reko and Leading Senior Constable Gabby Cole brought the issue to Chief Inspector Brendan Bernie who investigated how to secure a replacement medal for Margaret. After ongoing communication with representatives of Buckingham Palace, they were able to deliver the good news.

“Margaret never thought she’d see it again – and it’s such an honour, each medal has the recipient’s name engraved on it, so it’s not a matter of just sending out another,” he said.

And so, on the week of the 40^th anniversary of the train crash disaster, Margaret’s family members waited in the courtyard of Bowral Police Station in secret and made hushed jokes about how “annoyed” humble Margaret would be with their surprise visit.

“She’s a very private person, but we all wanted to be here to support Aunty Margaret. It’s so good of the police to make sure she had this medal in time for the anniversary,” relative Gordon Cole said. 

What became apparent as Margaret accepted the replacement medal was the extreme sense of pride she had in the rescue teams involved at the Granville crash.

“Everything we did, we did as well as we could at the time. I had such good training, and I was so well supported by the teams,” she said.

Margaret, who said she’d had “a pretty marvellous career”, also worked in mining rescues at Broken Hill, for the Royal Flying Doctor Service and with rescue teams in Canada.

Hume LAC police officers installed a safe for Margaret to ensure her medals would be well protected. “Don’t worry, I’m not letting anyone’s hands on it this time,” she laughed.