Esh Winning

Esh Winning is a village, and location of a former colliery, in County Durham, England. It is situated in the Deerness Valley 5mi to the west of Durham. The village was founded by the Pease family in the 1850s to service a new mine on the Esh Estate.The name of the village comes from two elements, first the older nearby village of Esh, a Saxon term for Ash, and second Winning, which was a Victorian term used when coal was found.Mining historyPaul Burnham opened the Esh mine opened in 1866, closing for economic reasons between 1930 and 1942; it then reopened in 1942 before finally closing in June 1968.In March 2006 the National Lottery granted £25,200 towards the restoration of the Esh Winning Colliery banner. The banner group planned to use the money to restore the banner, which was on display at Beamish Museum, and to produce a replica for display at the Durham Miners' Gala.Opencast mining was performed in the hills around the village from the late 1970s to 1990s, after which the land was reclaimed and restored.MediaThe second episode of the 1975 series Days of Hope was set amongst the miners in Esh Winning during the 1921 lock-out.Railway historyThe village was served by the stone- and timber-built Waterhouses railway station on the Deerness Valley Railway. Although the goods yard was located in the village of Waterhouses, passenger service was handled through Esh Winning. The station opened on 1 November 1877, and closed to passengers on 29 October 1951 and to freight on 28 December 1964. The route of the line is now part of the eight-mile Deerness Valley Railway Path.