thebloomsburygroup:

“I’m not sure whether The Times will by now have announced that Virginia is missing. I’m afraid there is not the slightest doubt that she drowned herself about noon last Friday. She had left letters for Leonard and Vanessa. Her stick and footprints were found by the edge of the river.

For some days, of course, we hoped against hope that she had wandered crazily away and might be discovered in a barn or a village shop. But by now all hope is abandoned; only, as the body has not been found, she cannot be considered dead legally.”

Letter from Clive Bell to Frances Partdrige in April 1941, discussing Virginia Woolf’s disappearance.