Privacy and free don't work well together; a free provider has to support itself somehow, and most of the ways it could do so inherently reduce your privacy.
Personally, I'd suggest going to gandi.net and getting a domain name from them for $15/year, which comes with email: 5 real accounts, umpteen forwarding accounts, IMAP, SMTP, and a decent webmail client (roundcube). Plus, you get an email address at your own domain, not tied to any one email provider, making it easy to switch later if you want.
Personally, I'd suggest going to gandi.net and getting a domain name from them for $15/year, which comes with email: 5 real accounts, umpteen forwarding accounts, IMAP, SMTP, and a decent webmail client (roundcube). Plus, you get an email address at your own domain, not tied to any one email provider, making it easy to switch later if you want.