Marilyn Monroe's Lost Love Letters Auctioned Off for $1 Million?

They were kept out of the prying eyes of the public. And now, fans and the rest of the world are now learning a bit more about movie icon Marilyn Monroe through some of the love letters she received during her lifetime.

The missives are said to be part of the "Lost Archives," which is "a collection of 300 items including letters from her second husband, baseball star Joe DiMaggio, that were sent just before their divorce," Time reported. These will be auctioned at Julien's Auctions in Beverly Hills, California next month.

According to MarketWatch, DiMaggio's letters "tell tale of unrequited love" as they were those that he sent in his efforts to save his marriage to the famous bombshell.

"I love you and want to be with you," he said in one letter. "There is nothing I would like better than to restore your confidence in me."

Those lines were written around the time the actress filed for divorce in 1954, which is just a couple of months after they married.

Aside from DiMaggio's letters, the collection also includes missives from Jane Russell, Clark Gable, and Cary Grant. Russell had pleaded with the "Some Like It Hot" star to give the baseball star another chance in "10 neatly handwritten pages," People said.

"It really gives you the chills when you read some of the stuff and see the intimacy and the personal nature of it," said Martin Nolan, the curator of the auction.

Meanwhile, auction owner Darren Julien expects a $1 million haul for the collection, judging by the increased "collectability" of Monroe's possessions, partly due to European and Asian collectors with a yen for such pop-culture items.

"We anticipate a lot of fans will be here. They'll fly in from all over the world," Julien speculated.

The Hollywood legend had bequeathed the collection to her mentor and acting coach Lee Strasberg, who, in turn, entrusted "The Lost Archives" to a friend who he believed would take good care of the artifacts.

Julien said that the "friend" in question has chosen to remain anonymous, People noted.

"Other items include a black velvet cocktail dress, a brassiere (starting bid $6,000 to $8,000) a pill bottle, an assortment of jewelry and glamor shots, a chest X-ray, a chrome beehive-shaped blender and a behind-the-scenes film reel from 'The Misfits' (starting bid $10,000 to $20,000)," CNN said. "The most expensive item among the 200 mementos is her overcoat, which has a starting bid of up to $120,000."

Among the love letters included in the auction are those from her third and last husband, playwright Arthur Miller.

"You were placed in the jaws of this society without the protection of a family, a name, an identity; it is quite as though you were the pure victim," he wrote. "I do know how desperately you want to shake loose from all the dragging horrors of the past."

While fans may agree to Miller's observation, the blonde beauty did not, as shown in her response, as noted by People: "In other words, there was no choice to make, the same road was always before me. So for you to speak of my nobility, it really wasn't so noble."