VILLAGERS are being urged to get behind a campaign to restore a pit banner to its former glory and make a replica of it to march at the Durham Miners Gala.

The Esh Winning Colliery Banner Group has been set up to raise money for the restoration of the village mine's banner, which has been kept at Beamish Museum for several years.

The group also wants to commission an exact replica of the emblem - which features Durham NUM headquarters at Redhills on the front and a miner and coal owner shaking hands before an angel on the back - which would be paraded at next year's Big Meeting.

The group hopes to win Lottery funding for the project and may also seek business sponsorship as well as holding fundraising events.

The group will hold a public meeting on Thursday, September 1, at 7pm in the Communal Hall, Woodland Road, which it hopes many villagers will attend.

Group member Bob Heslop said: "The banner is a bit tattered and torn and could not really be paraded again.

"We want to restore that and put it in a case and display it somewhere. We also want to have an exact replica made which we can take to the Gala.

"This is a mining village, like hundreds of others in County Durham, and we have no sort of memorial to the miners and we should have something like this as a tribute to those who worked in the mine.

"People say it is history but it is history you can remember. We have lived through it and a lot of people will be very proud if this banner is carried at the Gala, especially if the Esh Colliery Band is playing in front.''

The colliery closed in 1968.