Winnie the Pooh letters could sell for £18,000

Two letters written in the guise of Winnie the Pooh by illustrator E H Shepard are expected to fetch a total of £18,000 at auction next month, it was revealed today.

The notes, which are littered with the famous bear’s misspellings, were written 70 years ago as replies to a little boy’s party invitations.

But Dr Harry Stopes-Roe, son of birth control pioneer Marie Stopes, today told PA News he felt it was now a ‘‘suitable time’’ to sell the letters he received and treasured as a child.

Shepard was a friend of his mother’s and lived ‘‘only a few miles away’’ near Guildford, Surrey, he added.

‘‘Both my mother and I were very much fans of Winnie the Pooh.

‘‘We had parties on my birthday and at Christmas every year and Shepard and Pooh were always invited.

‘‘Quite often Shepard came, but when he did not come he sent those letters.’’

Both letters going on sale begin are addressed to ‘‘Buffkins’’, as Dr Stopes-Roe was known as a child.

One reads: ‘‘We are so sory that we cant come to yuor party’’ (sic).

Dated March 17 and believed to have been written around 1930, the note ends with sketches of Pooh and his friend Piglet weeping.

It is estimated to fetch up to £10,000 at Christie’s in South Kensington, west London, on June 14.

The second letter, written on headed paper from Shepard’s home address at Long Meadow, Longdown, Guildford, makes reference to the children’s entertainment that was always provided at the Stopes’ parties.

‘‘There was always an entertainer - a conjuror or Punch and Judy,’’ said Dr Stopes-Roe, a retired lecturer and vice-president of the British Humanist Association.

The letter, dated December 21 and accompanied by an envelope with a 1930 postmark, reads: ‘‘I am very sorry that I canot come to your party. I love Punch and Judy but I am rather frigtned but it would be all rite siting near you. Love from Pooh. (sic)’’

It has an illustration of Pooh holding a sprig of holly and is estimated to be worth between £6,000 and £8,000.

‘‘Having thought about them and realised how valuable they were, now seemed to be a suitable time to sell them,’’ said Dr Stopes-Roe.

A third surviving letter was handed over to the British Library’s archive along with four plasticine figures of Pooh and his friends last December.

Shepard, who died in 1976, was working as a cartoonist for Punch at the time when he was recommended to Pooh author A A Milne.

He also illustrated many other books, including Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows.