Chicago, Feb 16 (IANS) Love letters revealing a secret romance between former US President John F Kennedy and a Swedish woman in the 1950s have been put on auction.

The bidding for the collection, which includes 11 letters and three telegrams written by Kennedy to his Swedish girl friend Gunilla von Post, starts at $25,000, Legendary Auctions in Lansing announced on its website Monday.

The handwritten letters and telegrams were reportedly sent from Kennedy to the flaxen-haired von Post while he was a US senator.

'I thought I might get a boat and sail around the Mediterranean for two weeks - with you as crew. What do you think?,' read one of the letters dated June 28, 1954.

However, the auction house is hoping that bidders will be drawn more by the collection's historic significance than the promise of juicy details.

'They are remarkable,' said president of University Archives John Reznikoff. '(The letters) show the sensitive and human side, they show the fallibility of the person who was going to lead the western world, avert the Cuban missile crisis and stand at the Berlin Wall.'

The long-distance romance was first made public by Von Post in her book released in 1997. Von Post, 78, revealed that she met Kennedy in August 1953, just a few weeks before he married Jacqueline Bouvier, Chicago Tribune reported.

Although von Post gave reference of the letters in her book, they have never been revealed in their entirety, according to Legendary Auctions President Doug Allen.

One of the letters, written in red ink, foreshadows the end of the relationship, which von Post said dissolved around 1956.

It reads: 'I just got word today - that my wife and sister are coming here. It will all be complicated the way I feel now - my Swedish flicka... All love, Jack'.