Esmé the Guardian of Snowdonia is the last of my trilogy of books which I decided to write about women who made a notable contribution to rural life in the last century.

The story of Rachel’s Dairy turned out to be three generations who span a hundred years as they each pioneered the development and growth of organic farming; the Ladies of Blaenwern were well known musicians who turned to breed Welsh Cobs in Cardiganshire and their Llanarth stud became a global success; and now, Esmé, a remarkable woman, not only a farmer of 3,000 acres in rugged Snowdonia and 2,000 of Welsh mountain sheep, she became a leading conservationist forming the Snowdonia Society, the watchdog of the Snowdonia National Park.

Those are bare facts of seventy years of her life at Dyffryn the farmhouse near Capel Curig perched two hundred feet on Glyder Fach above the main road to Pen-y-Pass and Llanberis.

As Lord Dafydd Ellis Thomas in his foreword writes of the mountains and those who live there: “Visitors over generations who have found the climate and culture of such areas incomprehensible, if not threatening will always have great difficulty in appreciating why people who love such landscapes do so with such determined ferocity.”

Esmé was swept off her feet when Thomas Firbank married her in 1934 following an intense courtship of a few weeks but the flame of love dimmed and within five years he left the farm for the Army. But before war was declared he wrote of their relationship and experiences learning of the rigour of mountain life, saw his publisher and it was published in 1940.

It was a bestseller and Esmé was left to farm herself because he never returned. She took up the challenge. The mountain farmers in the locality were in awe of her bravery and of how quickly she learnt – a woman in the mountains on her own – she had a stubborn streak.

Teleri Bevan
Teleri Bevan

She was of short physique, strong and lithe. She could lift sheep easily and she had learned the technique of catching and lifting the cunning Welsh mountain rams wearing strong nail boots. She had stamina, never gave up and at the occasional rest day to visit towns, she was smart. Her hair always well cut, her clothes very often red and her make-up immaculate especially around her eyes. And without exception everyone who knew her well said her kitchen was bedlam even though she cooked marvellous meals.

On shearing days, the neighbours would number twenty or thirty men to shear, Dyffryn was the largest farm in the valley. Esmé would feed them all with roast beef, potatoes and peas followed with rice pudding. A pudding which was sweet giving everyone energy made either in a bucket or in a bin and cooked on a primus stove. These were the days of the 1940s, before the electric shears arrived on the scene and made the task much easier and quicker.

She loved the mountains, in all weathers but in the years after the war the number of tourists increased in Snowdonia. They were mobile and in 1951 National Parks were established.

Snowdonia – covering 827 square miles and 37 miles of coastline – was the largest, and straddled three county councils; Gwynedd, Caernarfon and Denbigh which caused difficulties for governance. It took two years to resolve the complexity of the problem. The first Freedom to Roam Bill was introduced to Parliament in 1884, it was defeated as were ten other attempts until 2000 when the Countryside and Rights of Way Act was passed.

Esmé had treasured the landscape around her and had tried schemes to provide facilities for tourists. The need to protect the environment from misuse was becoming an urgent concern for her. She had married Peter Kirby in 1949, a professional military man who became Curator of the Royal Welsh Fusilier Army at Caernarfon Castle and Esmé was deliberating and discussing the possibility of establishing a society.

The Snowdonia Society was formed in 1967 and as Chairman it became almost a full-time occupation, so she advertised for a tenant for the farm which released her time and her energy. Members who joined the society were hands-on, keeping their eyes on the quantity of litter left at lay-byes for example and those who despoil the landscape and the membership soon reached 3000. Her main thrust was lobbying in high places, hundreds of letters were written with her felt pen and her success rate was remarkable.

The society flourished but Esmé was approaching her eighties and she was voted out of the Chair of the Society but she gathered her resources and formed the Esmé Kirby Snowdonia Trust and turned her energies to rid the grey squirrels on Anglesey. She found a young scientist who had the similar ideas and before she died in 1999 she was well satisfied, the red squirrel was saved from extinction.

Esmé was an active conservationist leading from the front – often it was not comfortable, but she was a lady of action although she abhorred the weight of ‘bureaucratic politics’.

Esmé: Guardian of Snowdonia by Teleri Bevan is published by YLolfa, price £9.95