A condolence letter . from President Lyndon Johnson to the widow of slain civil rights . leader the Rev . Martin Luther King Jr. was sold for just half the price expected at an auction on Thursday . The typed note from Johnson to Coretta Scott King dated . April 5 , 1968 , the day after King was gunned down by a white supremacist in Memphis , Tennessee , sold for $ 60,000 at Quinn 's Auction Galleries in Falls Church , Virginia . The 47-year-old correspondence , written on White House Stationary , expressed the then Commander-in-Chief 's sadness at the civil rights leader 's death and reiterated his determination to find the assassin . Historic : The letter from President Johnson to Coretta Scott King , dated April 5 , 1968 , the day after King was shot by a white supremacist , has sold for $ 60,000 at Quinn 's Auction Galleries in Falls Church , Virginia . Relationship : Johnson ( pictured shaking King 's hand during the signing of the Civil Rights Bill in 1964 ) told his widow they would do everything possible to track down his killer . It read : 'We will overcome this calamity and continue the work of . justice and love that is Martin Luther King 's legacy and trust . to us . 'Since early morning , I have devoted all my hours and energy to honoring your good husband in the manner he would most approve . I have sought — by word , deed and official act — to unite this sorrowing and troubled nation against further and wider violence . ' Johnson won election to his own four-year term in 1964 but . chose not to run again in 1968 after Kennedy 's younger brother , . Robert F. Kennedy , then a U.S. senator from New York , entered . the race for the Democratic nomination . RFK was himself . assassinated in Los Angeles two months after King was slain . The opening bid was $ 60,000 , the sum an online bidder ultimately . paid for it , though the item had been expected to fetch at least $ 120,000 , according to the company 's website . Auctioneer Matthew Quinn said the letter had special . resonance given the 50th anniversary this month of the 'Bloody . Sunday ' protest march at Selma , Alabama , a turning point in the . U.S. civil rights movement , and the release of the King-centered . movie , 'Selma . ' Collection : Sixteen MLK items in all sold for a total of $ 99,668 . They included a guest book with more than 1,500 signatures from one of two wakes for King ( bottom ) However he told The Washington Post the turnout of the sale was unexpected : 'We ’ re obviously disappointed . But that ’ s what the market does . ' Coretta Scott King held on to the letter until 2003 , then . gave it to singer and social activist Harry Belafonte . She died . in 2006 . When Belafonte tried to auction it off in 2008 , King 's . children objected , and the sale was canceled . The two sides . became embroiled in a legal battle . A 2014 settlement allowed Belafonte to keep the letter and . Belafonte gave it to his half-sister , Shirley Cooks . She and her . husband , Stoney Cooks , a staff member of King 's Southern . Christian Leadership Conference , put it up for sale with other . memorabilia . Stoney Cooks said the letter was remarkable because Johnson , . who had signed landmark civil rights legislation into law , wrote . it while grappling with the unrest unleashed by King 's murder . ' I thought that quick response showed something about the . nature of the relationship between the two men , ' Cooks said . Sixteen MLK items in all sold for a total of $ 99,668 at the auction . They included a guest book with more than 1,500 signatures from one of two wakes for King and drafts of speeches he had written .
Typed note was sent to Coretta Scott King on April 5 , 1968 . Was the day after her husband was gunned down in Memphis , Tennessee . Historic letter was expected to fetch $ 99,668 at Quinn 's Auction Galleries in Falls Church , Virginia , on Thursday . Sixteen MLK items , including drafts of speeches , were sold for $ 120,000 .