VISITORS to the ‘Pals’ memorials in Northern France are facing a struggle to get there after ‘harassment’ from a local farmer.

The memorial site at Serre-les-Puisieux contains a memorial wall made from Accrington brick to the town’s ‘Pals’ battalion alongside plaques to similar regiments from Burnley and Chorley who fought in the Battle of the Somme during the First World War.

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However, foreign secretary Boris Johnson has been asked to investigate claims that soldiers’ relatives have had difficulty visiting their graves in France a century after hundreds of soldiers from East Lancashire made the ultimate sacrifice.

Steve Williams, who runs Flat Iron Heritage and has conducted around 25 coach tours to the region since 2002, contacted his MP, Lindsay Hoyle, after families had difficulty visiting the memorial site in September.

He said they were targeted by a farmer who owns land close to the half-mile track which leads to the the cemetery.

Mr Williams, a historian from Brindle, said: “It takes around 15 minutes to walk along the track to the memorial but of the 46 people on the tour, three of them were unable to make it on foot.

“I arranged a car to travel along the track and we began to make our way but the farmer in question was driving up and down at high speed and acting in an intimidatory way.

“The cemeteries, memorials and the access to them were given to the War Graves Commission in perpetuity by the French government after the war.

“I’ve been working with schools and was planning visits here but while this situation persists we can’t organise any more trips to the memorials.”

The path is owned by the town of Serre while the park itself is looked after by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC).

The commission’s director, General Victoria Wallace, said: “We are very concerned about the situation at Serre.

“I urge any visitors encountering hostility or harassment to report it to the local authorities.

“We are working with the French government and local authorities to find long-term solutions.”

Mr Hoyle has written to the foreign secretary asking his department to investigate after the issue caused his constituents ‘a huge amount of distress’.

He said: “Restrictions have been placed on visitors to the memorial site at Serre.

“A group of constituents recently visited to pay their respects to relatives but were not granted access to the site.”

As well as monuments to the Pals regiments, there are four cemeteries at the site which attract around 200,000 British visitors each year.