WHAT a super character Jemima Morrell was (The Press, April 25). May I also refer you to a somewhat later Alpine adventure undertaken in 1874 by an anonymous group of five ladies, three of whom also came from Yorkshire.

At the start of their two weeks in the Alpine area, three of them climbed Mont Blanc and became the first group of females to do this together. Their book was published in 1875 as Swiss Notes, by Five Ladies, with only their first names being used. Following my research here and in Switzerland, in 2003 I republished their book with a supplement detaling their individual backgrounds and full names and describing the searches of hotel registers, etc, in Chamonix and Zermatt. The chaperone was found to be Mary Taylor, the friend of Charlotte Brontë, and the other Yorkshire ladies were Fanny Richardson, daughter of the Vicar of Kilburn, and Grace Hirst from Luddenden (who by coincidence I remember meeting in 1939 as she was an aunt of my grandfather!).

Modern health and safety requirements would have had hysterics at their adventures.

Peter A. Marshall, Cross Lane, Low Bentham.