Richard Colt Hoare, owner of the Stourhead estate, made the first of many visits to Wales in 1793. He stopped at Crickhowell to salmon fish and the travelled on to Brecon.This view painted from upstream of the town, shows the bridge over the Usk and the tower of St Mary's Church. On the left you can see the weir and mill. A few years later this was used to feed wter into the new Brecon-Newport Canal.

Colt Hoare visited Brecon many times and provided the historian Theophilus Jones with illustrations for his History of Brecknockshire.