Letters sent to the family of Virginia Woolf after her suicide have been published for the first time.

In 1941 the author loaded her pockets with stones and walked into the River Ouse near her home in Rodmell, near Lewes.

Her suicide was seen as both tragic and shocking even to a nation in the turmoil of the Second World War.

Hundreds of people sent their condolences to Virginia's husband Leonard and her sister Vanessa Bell.

The letters have been stored in the special collections section in the library at the University of Sussex for more than 30 years.

They include messages from eminent intellectuals and writers of the time such as EM Forster, HG Wells and TS Eliot, as well as students, reformers, refugees, devoted readers and the Woolfs' close circle of Sussex friends and relatives.

Sybil Oldfield, a research reader in English at the university, has spent five years tracing the writers and surviving relatives to seek permission to publish as many of the 250 letters as possible.

The end result is a book called Afterwords, Letters On The Death Of Virginia Woolf.

Mrs Oldfield said: "This is the end of the story of her life but the letters also give us a fresh perspective on what was thought about Virginia Woolf by her contemporaries, especially her personal relationships.

"During her life she was accused of being aloof and sarcastic but it is obvious from many of these letters people felt supported by her and sensitively understood. It sounds depressing to look through letters like these but they were actually really positive and life-affirming and an honour to read."

Her childhood housekeeper Sophie Farrell, who was living at Sharpstone in Sussex, wrote: "She was always so sweet and good to me, I could never forget her."

Her former lover, the writer Vita Sackville-West described "a loss that can never diminish."

Her Brighton doctor, Octavia Wilberforce, wrote: "It was such an unforgettable joy to be with her and feel the brilliance of her mind."

However, the announcement of Woolf's suicide in The Times also fuelled an attack on her apparent cowardice.

As Mrs Oldfield's introduction explains, Leonard Woolf knew his wife took her own life because she feared an incurable attack of the depressive illness that had dogged her life.

Unfortunately the reference in her suicide note to "those terrible times", meaning her bouts of insanity, were misquoted in the newspapers as "these terrible times", meaning the war.

This triggered some unsympathetic reactions from those who thought she was wrong to take her own life while others were fighting for their country.

Mrs Oldfield said: "It just shows how a small thing like that can cause such a huge problem. Her husband did his best to clear her memory but it was a difficult task."

Mrs Oldfield has written many essays on Woolf and has been invited to give the Virginia Woolf Birthday Lecture in January 2006.

She hopes Afterwords will serve as a revealing, many-sided tribute to the life and death of one of the most famous intellectuals of the 20th Century.