The hamlet
Population	193 (2011)
Unitary authority	Darlington
Ceremonial county	County Durham
Region	North East
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	Stockton-on-Tees
Postcode district	TS21
Police	Durham
Fire	County Durham and Darlington
Ambulance	North East
List of places UK England County Durham

54°34′23″N 1°27′43″W / 54.573°N 1.462°W / 54.573; -1.462 Little Stainton is a village in the borough of Darlington and the ceremonial county of County Durham, England. It is a township in the parish of Bishopton, County Durham,^[1] situated a few miles west of Stockton-on-Tees. From the Census 2011 the population of Little Stainton has included that of Great Stainton and was 193.^[2] It is a hamlet, consisting of houses and farms that have no local service facilities.^{[citation needed]} On one side of the street, a stream—Bishopton Beck—runs along the bottom of the gardens.

History

It is rumoured that the last witch in England was to be hanged in Little Stainton.^{[citation needed]}

For much of its history Little Stainton was part of the parish of Bishopston.^[3] This means that it did not have its own parish church and instead the inhabitants would have journeyed to Bishopston to attend religious services. In the medieval period (1066 to 1540) Little Stainton was larger than it is now. The sites of some of the buildings can still be seen as earthworks. Although, the remains are excellent, some were destroyed in 1991–2. Archaeologists recorded some medieval pottery on the site after the ploughing. In the area around Manor Farm a number of fragments of 10th and 11th century pottery have also been discovered. These suggest that the village probably had an Anglo-Saxon origin; a possibility also reflected in its name: 'Stainton' means 'stoney farm' in Old English.

Sadly little else is known about the history of this area. In the post-medieval period it remained mainly an agricultural area although in the 19th century there was a large brick and tile works

Until around 1960, Little Stainton consisted of a group of individual farms, to which was added a set of four council houses with agricultural dwelling restrictions. In the late 1980s, planning permission was granted for a series of private dwellings that have transformed Little Stainton into a rural agglomeration of dwellings, within which the farms now constitute a minority. Although much of the land around the dwellings is owned by the farms, many of the private dwellings have a substantial amount of land, ranging from 2 acres (8,100 m²) to about 5 acres (20,000 m²).