Published 17:53 IST, June 28th 2020
Winnie the Pooh illustrator Ernest Howard's letter to fan sold at auction for £12,500
The letter was written on March 23, 1935, to a man named Harry Stopes-Roe, whose mother was a friend of the illustrator, Ernest Howard Shepard.
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Winnie the Pooh cartoon illustrator Ernest Howard Shepard's letter that he had written to one of his fans recently sold at an auction for a whopping amount of £12,500. Shepard, reportedly wrote the letter to one of his fans whose birthday party he couldn't attend. The letter was written on March 23, 1935, to a man named Harry Stopes-Roe, whose mother was a close friend of Shepard. In the letter, Shepard apologised to Harry for not being able to attend his birthday party that was on March 30 the same year.
"We are teribly sorry that we shan’t be able to come to your party on March 30th but we are going to be away. Thank you so much for inviteing us," Shepard wrote in the letter. Some of the spellings in the letter were deliberately misspelled because the character Pooh was known for it. The letter also contained a tearful drawing of Pooh and Piglet between the salutation and a 7-line message. The letter was addressed to Buffkins, the childhood nickname of the humanist Dr. Harry Stopes-Roe, who died in 2014.
Shepard would often attend Buffkins' birthday parties, but when he couldn't he would send one of these letters of apology. The letter was sold by the children of Harry Stopes-Roe and his wife Mary Neville Wallis, herself the daughter of the illustrious scientist, engineer, and inventor Sir Barnes Neville Wallis (1887-1979). The letter was put on auction by Dominic Winter Auctioneers in England on June 25, 2020.
Winnie the Pooh
Winnie the Pooh was created by Alan Alexander Milne and was illustrated by Shepard. The first collection of stories came in the form of a book in 1921, which later went on to become of the best sellers.
17:52 IST, June 28th 2020