The material comprises 148 letters from John Ruskin to Miss Blanche Atkinson (1847-1917) as follows::
- (a) numbers 1-140, letters from Ruskin to Miss Atkinson, mostly addressed to her at 19 Edge Lane, Liverpool, 25 March 1873-November 1884. The majority were written between 1873 and 1875;
- (b) numbers 141-148, letters from Ruskin to Miss Atkinson (April 1873-December 1878); these originally formed part of the collection donated by Mrs Rawnsley (numbers 1-140 above), as the series of numbers on the envelopes indicates.