A message from the Vicar
Dear Friends,
It is a year since we launched our Friends of Llantrithyd Church group and I'm pleased to say that it appears to be going very well. This edition of our newsletter includes an interview with Maria Leijerstam from the neighbouring deer park. As the title suggests, she is our local celebrity, and you can read about her achievements in the article below. The deer park has a long-established link with the Church and Llantrithyd Place, and their histories are interwoven. Nick Russill, Maria's partner, is also a church member and runs this website. Please support the Deer Park shop, which sells high-quality local products.
You'll also read about entries in the parish registers from centuries ago. Apologies for the photo quality, but hopefully you'll still be able to make out some of the original entries. A parishioner has shared a poem that makes the Church and those associated with it its main subject.
I've also decided to include just a few details from the quinquennial report. This may seem a little arid, but it gives a sense of the scale of work needed to keep the Church and Churchyard safe and usable. Any contributions you make to the Friends will help support this work.
On that note, we have had to change our QR code for contributions to the Friends of Llantrithyd Church, so please use the new one below if you'd like to donate.
The form to become a Friend can be found on our Join Us page, or alex2rees3@gmail.com.
Finally, I wish you all a happy and peaceful Christmas and New Year. You are all most welcome to attend any of the services held at St Illtyd's Church, Llantrithyd.
Michael John (Vicar)
Christmas (Village) Carol Service: Monday 22 December at 7 pm
Christmas Day Holy Eucharist & Carols: 9.30 am
Quinquennial work
At the AGM in July, Alan Meredith gave a presentation on the tower repairs, which were completed after many months of grant applications and faculty procedures. He explained that this was mostly work identified in the Quinquennial Inspection.
Each inspection report ends with three lists of work it recommends should be carried out on the Church:
- Urgent works requiring immediate attention
- Works recommended as essential within the next 18 months
- Works recommended as essential within the next 5 years
Below is a very small selection of the items identified in the most recent inspection:
- Repoint the flagstone surface water trough to the west side of the porch
- Remove green mould from inside the porch and apply an anti-fungicide agent
- Lift the ledger stone in the Sanctuary and relay the floor to form a level surface
- Dress back the fixing clip for the lightning conductor
- Repair stone mouldings and quoins to the windows
- Remove ivy growth from the boundary walls
- Repoint the boundary wall gate posts and repair the timber gate
- Remove plant growth from footpaths within the churchyard
- Take down and rebuild the boundary wall where cracks and collapse have occurred
- Cut back the overhanging tree in front of the Chancel
The estimated total cost of repairs needing immediate attention is £20,000 plus VAT, while repairs to be completed within five years come to a further £24,000 plus VAT.
Church registers
Those of you who came to our AGM may have noticed the display of our Church registers. Several go back centuries, but the most ancient have been taken to the Glamorgan Archives to ensure they are preserved in the right conditions.
We still hold facsimiles of the older documents, but unfortunately most are almost entirely illegible. This may be due to a combination of poor-quality copying, tiny handwriting, or faded ink.
Thankfully, we can still make out many of the entries, and they make fascinating reading. The banns of marriage between Thomas Morgan and Catherine John, published in the 1750s, include the phrase "and consent of her parents", suggesting she was very young. A later entry records Thomas Lewis and Jane Thomas marrying "by licence" rather than by banns. This was an expensive option, so perhaps this marriage needed to take place in haste?
Banns of marriage from the 1750s, signed by the Rector, N. Hopkins.
The burials, predictably, tell a story of grief, including the interment of Dorothy Bishop, "a young Lady of the City of London", who died aged just 15 in 1811. There is also an infant death, Evan Meredith, the following year. Such entries would have been commonplace, yet no less heartbreaking for the families involved.
Maria Leijerstam: local adventurer
Maria is a British adventurer who lives in the village at Llantrithyd Deer Park. She appeared in the recent Coast and Country programme on ITV Wales, which showcased the historic Deer Park. Sir John Aubrey of Llantrithyd Place established the park in the mid to late 1600s, and Cadw now lists it as a historic park and garden.
Maria's sporting achievements span continents and disciplines. She has represented Wales and the UK in some of the world's toughest expedition races, multi-day events involving running, mountain biking and kayaking, in remote and challenging environments across Patagonia, Scandinavia, Africa, Portugal, Ireland and Croatia. Other notable events include the Land Rover G4 Challenge (2009) and the Three Peaks Yacht Race (2008).
In 2007, Maria became the first Welsh woman to compete in the Marathon des Sables, running six marathons over seven days through the Sahara's extreme heat. In 2012, she made history again as the first woman to finish the Siberian Black Ice Race, cycling across Lake Baikal, the world's deepest and longest frozen freshwater lake, in sub-zero temperatures.
Her most outstanding achievement came in 2013, when she became the first person ever to cycle to the South Pole. Setting off from the edge of the Antarctic continent on the Ross Ice Shelf on 17 December, she covered about 638 km (396 miles) in just 10 days, 14 hours and 56 minutes, setting a second world record for the fastest human-powered coast-to-pole traverse. She pedalled a custom three-wheeled recumbent trike across the Trans-Antarctic Mountains, including a climb up the Leverett Glacier to nearly 3,000 metres, battling extreme cold, strong winds and snowdrifts along the way. Her story is told in her book, Cycling to the South Pole.
Maria now manages Llantrithyd Deer Park, continuing the work her parents began 24 years ago. She aims to make the park as sustainable as possible: they generate about 80% of their own energy and draw water from a borehole. Maria recently began leading guided walks around the estate and sells ethically sourced venison from their herd in the park shop.
The Llantrithyd Park website has a wealth of information about Llantrithyd and the history of the Deer Park, as well as an online shop for venison, crafts and local firewood.
From the visitor book
"We found my 3rd great grandparents here. Wonderful day!"
Tina & Robert (USA), 8 August 2025
Liz & James, Perth, Western Australia, 15 October 2025
"Thank you for having this open."
Levi, Alaska, 17 September 2025