Sold! Letter From JFK to Alleged Mistress Auctions for Huge Price

It was expected to auction for $30,000, but the final price for a letter from former President John F. Kennedy to alleged mistress Mary Pinchot Meyer was higher — significantly higher.

RR Auction, with offices in the North End and storage and a store in Amherst, New Hampshire, auctioned the letter — along with numerous other JFK artifacts — on its site this month.

The highest bid was $89,000, nearly triple the expected price.

The four-page letter, as posted by RR Auction, reads in full:

“Why don’t you leave suburbia for once—come and see me—either here—or at the Cape next week or in Boston the 19th. I know it is unwise, irrational, and that you may hate it—on the other hand you may not—and I will love it. You say that it is good for me not to get what I want. After all of these years—you should give me a more loving answer than that. Why don’t you just say yes.”

The letter was never sent but was kept by White House Secretary Evelyn Lincoln. The auction house described it as revealing "JFK’s personality and the somewhat cavalier manner in which he conducted his affairs."

RR Auction extolled the faded presidential seal watermarks visible under bright light and the presence of Kennedy's signature, "J." It came accompanied by a full unused sheet of White House stationery and comes from the estate of Robert White.

Kennedy was killed the following month, likely making this letter among the last handwritten communications from his presidency (and thereby increasing its value).

RR Auction describes Kennedy's history with Meyer, "one of JFK’s alleged lovers," like this:

"After first meeting Kennedy while he was in high school at Choate, Meyer was reacquainted with him in 1954 when the Kennedys moved into a Georgetown home nearby. A socialite and painter, she became friends with Jackie; her husband was a CIA agent, which has piqued the interest of some conspiracy theorists. Once Kennedy was in office, Mary is said to have visited the White House frequently when Jackie was out of town. Nevertheless, they managed to keep the affair secret.

"... Mary Pinchot Meyer, too, was murdered under mysterious circumstances a year later, fueling the imaginations of investigators amateur and otherwise."

The auction closed Thursday.

>> Photo via RR Auction