LILLE, France (AFP) - The widow of a man who hanged himself at work began legal action on Monday against his employer after receiving a package in the post with his T-shirt, socks and the rope with which he hung himself.

Lysiane Reboul claimed her husband had been bullied by colleagues at his factory near Calais in northern France. She told French media she had written several letters to the factory to get back his personal effects from his locker.

But she was shocked when she opened a package sent to her home in Berck-sur-Mer to find the long and thick rope with which her husband had killed himself.

"An eight-kilo package was delivered to me. Inside was a T-shirt, some socks, a bag of pencils and the rope... Imagine the shock," Reboul told La Voix du Nord newspaper.

Reboul said she was suing the factory and hoped to have her husband's suicide recognised as a work-related death.

The manager of the factory reportedly admitted to a "serious mistake".

"The police had asked us to gather up his personal effects and the rope in case they needed them for the investigation," he wrote in a letter of apology quoted by the paper. "When you asked us for his effects we sent the packet they were in without checking."