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A series of love letters, handwritten by President John F. Kennedy to his Swedish lover, are for sale at a Boston auction house.
The intimate letters, addressed to Gunilla von Post, an aristocrat whom he met weeks before marrying Jacqueline Bouvier in 1953, reveal that Kennedy described their time together as a "brilliant memory of my life."
The eight-page collection, which includes a full letter and two partial messages, is from Von Post's personal collection and is expected to fetch more than $ 30,000.
Von Post passed away in 2011 and, before his death, in 1997 wrote a memoir about his relationship with the former president entitled "Love, Jack."
The love letters, written between 1955 and 1956, predate Kennedy's presidency.
At the time, Kennedy was a senator from Massachusetts, and the notes were on United States Senate letterhead.
This photo shows a love letter John F. Kennedy wrote to a Swedish mistress a few years after he married Jacqueline Bouvier, according to Boston-based RR Auction. The auction house says Kennedy wrote letters to aristocrat Gunilla von Post in 1955 and 1956, and announced, on Wednesday, May 5, 2021, that they will go up for auction. Credit: Nikki Brickett / AP
In them, Kennedy reflected on the couple's romantic trip to Sweden and responded to the news that Von Post was getting married. The future president told Von Post that he was "eager" to see her, calling her "wonderful" in a letter. In another, he simply signed "Jack."
Von Post and Kennedy met in the summer of 1953 in Cannes, just weeks before Kennedy and Bouvier's wedding on September 12. According to RR Auction, they later "spent a very blissful and intimate week consummating the relationship" in Sweden in August 1955, almost two years after their marriage.
The auction house also said that "Kennedy's efforts to end her marriage and bring her to the United States" were "thwarted by her father, his political ambitions, and Kennedy and von Post's mutual sensitivity to Jacqueline's miscarriage in 1955. ».
Another example of the cards being auctioned appears here.
Credit: Nikki Brickett / AP
In a letter dated February 1956, Kennedy appeared to respond to the news of Von Post's own marriage to landowner Anders Ekman.
He wrote: "I must say that I was saddened to learn that you will not come to America after all and marry a farmer."
Referring to the couple's trip to Sweden, he continued: “I was planning to come back next summer to see you… and now what will happen.
In any case let me know what you are going to do.
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«If you don't get married come (to the United States) since I would like to see you.
I had a wonderful time with you last summer.
It is a brilliant memory of my life… you are wonderful and I miss you », he concluded.
This photo shows an envelope that John F. Kennedy addressed to his Swedish lover.
Credit: Nikki Brickett / AP
The couple would see each other only once more, in 1958 at a Waldorf Astoria gala, according to the auction house.
They both attended with their partners and Von Post was pregnant at the time.
The online auction of the cards is already underway and will end on May 12.
The letters are part of a larger presidential memorabilia sale, which also includes autographed photos and personal letters written by Abraham Lincoln.
It is not the first time that RR Auction offers the correspondence between Kennedy and a mistress.
Another four-page love letter written by Kennedy to another love interest, believed to be Mary Meyer, was also auctioned there in 2016. The letter was dated October 1963, a month before her assassination, and was never sent. .
John F. Kennedy
