Kemeys Commander

[1] Its unusual name is derived from the fact that the patronage of the church was at one time held by the Knights Templar and was a commandery or preceptory, as their houses were termed.

Both of these names are from the Welsh word cemais meaning 'bend in a river', and this is an apt description of the site of this village, which stands at the centre of a long bend of consistent radius.

In 1799 Archdeacon William Coxe came here during his Historical Tour in Monmouthshire (published 1801) and wrote "We here mounted our horses and rode through thickets across the fields to Kemeys Commander, a small village".

The altar slab, apparently not pre-Reformation, is severely mounted on plain stone squares and in keeping with the austere lines of the building.

The small south door has been built in, and entrance to the building is through the timbered west porch, above which is a turret containing two bells, one of which is of 13th-century date but slightly smaller than those at Gwernesney.

A bridge was here as early as the 16th century but was washed away in winter floods in 1690 and was eventually replaced, in 1730, by a solid oak structure known as Pont Kemeys.