Man chased thieves who had stolen his train

Former Royal Navy official Paul Kenny pursued the three men and tried to wrest the valuable replica from their grasp.

And as they sped off in a getaway car he refused to let go of his prized 3ft-long model and ended up being pulled along behind for 30ft.

After being forced to let go, the 75 year old was left lying on the ground with cuts and bruises to his hands and knees and blood stains on the road.

Kindly staff from a nearby care home helped patch him up following the dramatic incident outside his £400,000 home in leafy Chilworth near Southampton.

Mr Kenny believes the Victorian 335 Southern Railway model - which weighs six stone (37.5kg) and sells for up to £14,000 - was stolen to order as the thieves appeared to know what they were looking for.

He said: “I just can’t understand why would people go and steal things like that," he said. "I can understand pinching a push bike - you can sell them quick - or jewellery, but not something like my train.

“You need tracks to use the train, so it is a very specific item.”

The former Head of Safety and Monitoring for Defence and Ammunitions at the Royal Navy told how his dog Poppy had alerted him to the raid last Monday.

“I had been working on my car out the front of the house and came in to get something off the internet," he said. "My dog started barking and what I normally do is open the door and say ‘Come here, there’s no one there’ but there was someone there.

“These men were going down the side of the house with my train and so I ran after them.

“One of them had the train and he was running with it and the tubbier one tried to pull the branch off a tree out in front of me and I just ran straight through the branch as my adrenaline was going.

“I wasn’t going to let him get away with my train.

“He was struggling with it as I tried to pull it off him as he got in the car and I was hanging out the door.

“Then one of the guys shouted out ‘drive off Paul’ and he did drive off with me hanging onto the train trailing behind the car.”

Mr Kenny said he was so eager to get his train back he did not realise at the time he would have been better off ‘thumping’ the thief who tried to throw a branch in his way.

He said: “I was so intent on trying to get my train back but what I should have done is I should have turned round and flattened the thief.

“If I had taken him out at least I would have had something to hand over to the police. I should have just thumped him and taken him down.”

After Mr Kenny was left lying on the ground, two women who worked at a nearby care home came to help him and bandaged him up as he refused to let them call an ambulance.

He explained that he went back to the road where it had happened a few days later and there were still marks of his blood along it.

Mr Kenny added: “The evening it happened, I was tossing and turning because of the pain and all the bruises - I have marks on my hands and down my arm from where I got dragged down the road.”

Mr Kenny bought the model in 2015 for £3,000 as he has always had a fondness for trains. But he had not had the chance to use it much since his late partner, Eirlys, became ill with bowel cancer and he became her carer.

He said: “It is a little ironic that because she passed away last September, I planned to use it again but that’s not going to happen because some bastards stole it.”

The grandfather of two - who used to take the model to a nearby park to use the tracks there - said he was hopeful his train would be returned to him but ‘wouldn’t be surprised’ if he never saw it again.

Hampshire Police have issued a public appeal for help returning the train and for anyone who may have seen the dark blue VW Golf the raiders were driving.

PC Mike Elwood said: "If you have seen a model train like this recently or been offered to buy one, we want to hear from you.

"Similarly, we are keen to trace the car and its occupants and want to speak to any witnesses to this incident, which could have resulted in much more serious injuries to a vulnerable member of the community."

A Hampshire police spokesman today added: "I can confirm it is a Maxitrak 5” gauge SE & CR R1 train, 900mm long x 242mm wide x 341mm high, and weighs 37.5kg."