Mary Kate Canny

My Grandmother Mary Kate Canny was born on the 5th of February 1901 in Derrypark, now in the Parish of Tourmakeady, County Mayo. Her parents were John Canny (1876-1954) and Penelope/Belinda/Nappy Walsh (1880-1959). She was raised on her parents farm, by Lough Mask. By 1926 though, she is in Pelletstown (also called St Patrick's Mother and Baby Home), she has been given the name Mona Canny. Mona/Mary Kate had a baby in the home in 1923, also called Mona Canny. Very sadly, she passed at one year and two months old in mid 1924. Mary Kate/Mona is next found living in Euston Road in London in 1929, working as a hotel maid in 50 Maple Street, Fitzrovia, London. She got pregnant by a Dublin merchant seaman named William Quinn. On the 25th of September 1929, she gave birth to my mother, Nora Canny, she uses the Mona Canny name on the birth certificate. My mother shortly after was unofficially adopted by Mona's work colleague, Florence Spearman. My mother saw her only once, leaving a bicycle for Mum at the bottom of her front garden, then disappearing again. The family lore is that Mona/Mary Kate was killed during the battle of Britain when a bomb destroyed Matfellon Church in Whitechapel, London. Mona, the story goes, was hiding in the basement, then killed by a direct hit from a Nazi bomb. This story has never been confirmed, but its all I've got.