A JOURNEY to Usk, visiting the little churches of Llanfoist, Llanover, Llanfihangel Gobion, Llanfair Kilgeddin and Kemeys Commander.

Llanfoist

The name Llanfoist has been derived by various writers from ffos (trench), Foyle, Faustus and Gwys. Bradney tells us that the church was perhaps founded by Ffwyst, a priest of the college of Seiriol in Anglesey.

One of our most hilly parishes, Llanfoist extends from the Usk to the Torfaen (Afon Llwyd), but what an extent it is! Yet, when the Brecon and Abergavenny canal was cut through the parish, the company of Thomas Hill, who owned the ironworks at Blaenafon, made a tramroad from Blaenafon to the side of Cwmcraf, where pulleys, wheels and iron chains liberated the trams, loaded with coal, iron and limestone, down the terrible slope to the canal, while the empty ones are pulled up the steepy heights.

The boats were then laden, and hauled down to the port of Newport-on-Usk, to meet the ships which sail from pole to pole to all the harbours of the habitable globe.

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My quotations are taken from an essay written by Thomas Evan Watkin (Eiddil Ifor) of Llanfoist in 1834, who was one of the founders of the society known as Cymdeithas Cymreigyddion y Felli. At the first eisteddfod encouraged by the society in 1834 a prize was offered for a history of Llanfoist. Eiddil Ifor’s entry - the only one - was awarded the prize.

The essay was published, in Welsh and English, in 1822 by Y Brodyr Owen, Gasg Minerva, at Abergavenny and as entitled Hanes Llanffwyst, which seems to confirm Bradney’s derivation. I am obliged to Mr Robert L Williams, of the Old Schoolhouse, Llanfoist, who lent me his copy of the booklet.

In the heights above is the Punchbowl (in Welsh Taran Cwm y Disan) whence Cromwell’s men descended, as legend says, on the Royalists at Llanelen and in the neighbouring districts are many carn place names. Eiddil Ifor lists Carn y cadnaw (the fox mound), Carnddyrys (entangled mound), Carn y Blawreang (Blorenge mound), Carn y defaid (sheep’s mound), Carn y clochdy (steeple mound - to which we shall refer when we come to Trevethin) and Carn diffaeth (the desert mound).

He tells how in the time of persecution people were taken to the top of Cwm Craf, the height of which was found, in 1787, by an air weighing machine, to be 1,607ft. 5in, how they were placed in a wooden barrel, tied and closed up, the barrel penetrated with nails and then rolled topsy-turvy headlong down to the bottom.

Eiddil Ifor asserts that a village inn was built on the ruins of what was once considered to be an old monastery. He describes a field of the Maerdy farm named Cae’r Bedd (field of the grave) and gives the oral tradition that victims of the plague in Abergavenny were conveyed in wagons and buried in their clothes, just as they appeared when death came on the scene.

I walked to the church of St Faith in Llanfoist. It was restored in 1873 by Mr Crawshay Bailey in memory of his father, the great iron master, who had lived at Ty Mawr (now Llanfoist House). He was buried at Llanfoist. The church retains a few of the old monuments, while in the churchyard are some immemorial yews, and the column and base of a fine cross.

The porch contains a memorial stone of some interest. An Elizabethan - or early Stuart - lady is portrayed with ruff and praying hands, while her feet, under a front view, turn left.

Old Llanover

The cool sunlight of a March morning silvers Old Llanover. Set against the backcloth of clouds and great hills, church and cottages dream. The church glows between a vast yew tree on the one side and a weeping willow and lone pine on the other. A sparkling Nant-y-Mynedd joins the Usk under the arch of Ty’r Afon, the fishing cottage. Muted jade-green, the river flows strongly.

In this soft mystic light, the lovely hamlet seems too ethereal for this bustling, go-getting age. Can it survive? With all the slighting and despoiling of beautiful places, what can be done to retain this other-world sweetness of Llanover? We can schedule ancient monuments and places of historical significance. Before the horrid thing known as development deposits petrol pumps and roadhouses in this shrine of ours, will some enlightened authority take appropriate action?

Less than eight years ago, Old Llanover was in danger from the mightiest form of vandalism. It was actually proposed to erect an enormous generating power station, covering 180 acres of rich agricultural land, and to raise four cooling towers 200 feet high and four chimneys, 300 feet high, in this vale of tranquillity.

The vandals misjudged the men and women of Gwent. Led by that redoubtable Ancient Briton, Mr D L Jones OBE, our forces met the invader in full strength and, after a series of battles, our sacred soil was saved.

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As I stand on the river bank on this bright morning my imagination reels at the thought of Llanover shadowed by a pall of smoke and the exquisite river poisoned and ruined by the wastes of industry. The battles fought for Llanover and Machen Vale are among our finest gifts to posterity.

To cross the river, I use Mr Pim’s Bridge. Built by my dear old friend, the late Henry Smith, this pretty suspension bridge enabled Mr Leslie Pim MP - greatly beloved Mr Pim, to whom all the country folk took their troubles - to visit the old church.

In the churchyard lies buried the lady who gave character to Llanover, who restored the ancient arts and crafts of Wales to their rightful level, who reintroduced the love of beauty into country life. Lady Llanover was escorted to her grave by twenty maidens dressed in Welsh costume and on her coffin lay a wreath of white roses sent by the Duchess of Teck, who was to become in years later Queen Mary.

This is an extract from Fred Hando's Rambles in Gwent