About

Across time, people have sought connection in countless ways. From heartfelt declarations and calculated proposals to anonymous and desperate love songs.

A free exhibition at The National Archives in Kew, Love Letters will feature correspondence that spans over 500 years of devotion, longing, sacrifice, heartache, and passion.

Covering royalty and parliamentarians, literary icons and unknown scribes, Love Letters will open the envelope on the stories behind the documents and the consequences of their being, from eternal blessing to execution.

This revealing exhibition will feature not only letters, but declarations of love in other forms, including poems and drawings, official memorials and wills.

Encompassing forbidden relationships and family members separated by distance and circumstance, Love Letters will offer a rare glimpse into personal emotions captured in a government collection – tender, intimate and deeply human.