A weekly market and annual fair were granted by letters patent in the reign of Edward III.

There were 860 inhabitants in the parish in the early 1800s and a school for poor children was subsidised by Sir John Owen to the tune of £10 a year.

[2] The parish, prior to 1850, was one of scattered settlements,[3] with slate quarrying employing local people.

[5] The parish church of the Holy Martyrs, dedicated to seven sainted men of Mathry, is in the centre of the village.

[6] A genealogical search in 2006 by a Pembrokeshire man found that a Jemima Nicholas was baptised in the parish of Mathry on 2 March 1755.