Francis My Love

In her 1990 autobiography Ava: My Story, Ava Gardner said that Frank Sinatra was the love of her life. The two had met in 1943 at a Hollywood nightclub and, after seeing each other only occasionally over the years, met again at a party in 1949. They started an affair, with Sinatra still married to his first wife Nancy Barbato (with whom he had three children). On 7 November 1951, ten days after Sinatra's divorce had come through, Ava and Frank tied the knot, entering into a very tumultuous and highly publicised marriage. The two were both —in Ava's own words— "high-strung people, possessive and jealous and liable to explode fast", their temperaments often leading to heated fights, sometimes even in public. During their marriage, Ava got pregnant with Sinatra's child twice but in both cases had an abortion. On 29 October 1953, after two years of marriage, the couple formally announced their separation, with the divorce eventually being finalised in 1957. Ava and Frank remained good friends until Ava's death in 1990, at age 67. 

Ava Gardner and Frank Sinatra, who was Ava's third and final husband (Artie Shaw and Mickey Rooney being husband number one and two).

In April 1952, five months into their marriage, Ava wrote Sinatra the following note. At the time Ava was filming The Snows of Kilimanjaro (1952) at the 20th Century Fox Studios in Los Angeles while Sinatra was in New York. 

Source: Lot-tissimo

Transcript:

Francis my love —

I finally tricked Bappie [Ava's older sister] + Ben into buying some stationery for me so now I have to use it, cause it's new + cause I love you — That's all I have to say so goodnight baby— I can't wait till next Tuesday— Love, love, love, yours 

Ava