St. Anthony-in-Meneage

The beautiful candle-lit church of St Anthony-in-Meneage on the bank of Gillan Creek is well worth a visit. Said to have been built by shipwrecked Normans driven ashore by a terrible storm, it is first mentioned in a document from around 1170 as a possession of the Priory of Tywardreath, near St Austell.

During the English Civil War, local Royalists constructed a small fort on the Dennis headland. Surrendered in 1646, it was the last place in Cornwall — along with St Michael’s Mount and Pendennis Castle — to hold out against again the Parliamentary troops.