A FAMILY have spoken of their anger and disgust after an ornament was stolen from their mother's grave.

Gillian Gibson, from Higher Gate Close, Huncoat, was only 50-years-old when she died from long term health problems last year.

Her children adorned her grave in Burnley Road Cemetery with flowers and ornaments, and on Mother's Day, just a few days before what would have been her 51st birthday, placed a flashing globe statue next to her headstone.

But daughter Leah Dale, 29, was shocked to discover on Friday that the globe had gone, with a footprint in the ground where it had been pulled out of the soil.

Leah, who now lives in Morecambe and travels to Accrington once a week to visit her mum's grave, said: “I'm totally disgusted. I'm so angry.

“I know there are worse things that go on, it's only an ornament, but it's seeing somebody has stood in the mud and pulled the stick out of the ground. There's a big hole where they put their foot in the ground and pulled it out.

“She only died six months ago. It was her birthday a couple of days after Mother's Day so we've all been there a lot recently.

“It wasn't valuable, it's just what my sister and my nephew bought for her as a present.”

Miss Gibson, a mum-of-five and grandmother-of-four, attended Rhyddings High School, and was a former textile worker at Highams and service waitress at the Dunkenhalgh Hotel.

She suffered from severe liver problems for three years, which led to her kidneys failing and eventually a gastrointestinal bleed last autumn.

However, she was a prolific traveller, and in the last decade of her life visited 88 countries, also enjoying art and drawing and horse riding.

Leah said the ornament was last seen by her mum's plot on Tuesday, when family members visited the cemetery.

She said she had reported the incident to the police, who told her officers would come around today to take a full report.

She said: “I just want to let people know this has happened so they can be aware.”