At the time Mandela ’s Africa National Congress comrade, Chris Hani, had just been assassinated and Ali sent Mandela a brief letter of condolence.
After it was written out by hand it was given to the personal assistant of the manager of the hotel he was staying at to type up.
But in her nervous excitement at handling the task on behalf of such a big name guest, she misspelt Ali’s first name.
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The error was only spotted after it was given to the former boxing champion to sign. A second version was immediately typed up and sent to Mr Mandela instead.
Now 23 years later the woman, who is aged in hers 40s and lives in south west England, is selling the historic letter for £8,000.
In a letter of provenance the vendor has supplied with it, she said: “Due to my nervous excitement about typing a letter of such historical importance I misspelt the name Muhammad, replacing the last ‘a’ with an ‘e’.
“The letter was taken to Muhammad Ali and duly signed before someone noticed the error and returned it to me. I typed it again but kept the incorrect copy for posterity.”
Andrew Aldridge, of Henry Aldridge and Son auctioneers of Devizes, Wilts, which is selling the letter, said: “This letter represents a rare opportunity for a collector to acquire a letter from one of the most iconic and charismatic figures of the 20th century to one of the greatest men in history.
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“You would struggle to find another letter sent from and to two bigger personalities.
“As it turns out it was quite fortuitous for our vendor that her mistake was spotted after Ali had signed it, otherwise it would be worth considerably less.
“It has everything going for it. It has superb provenance, excellent content, is signed and dated and is unique.
“It will appeal to a wide range of collectors. Those who collect boxing memorabilia and of course those people who just collect iconic items from history.”
In April 1993 Ali was in South Africa to support the development of boxing there and met Mandela on April 19.
Chris Hani was killed on April 10 and Ali wrote his letter three days later from the Elangeni Hotel in Durban.
It is addressed to Mr Nelson R Mandela, president of the ANC and reads: “Dear Mr Mandela. Allow me to extend to you and the ANC my deepest regrets upon hearing of the death of Chris Hani.
“My prayers go out to Mr Hani’s family and the people of South Africa during these difficult days.
“I am providing you the following information regarding my itinerary should you desire to contact me (prior to our scheduled meeting on 19 April 1993).
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“Inshallah, I pray that God keeps you safe.”
The itinerary stated Ali was in Cape Town between April 13 to 16 and Johannesburg between April 16 to 22.
A second letter sent from Ali to Oliver Tambo, the then president of the ANC, is also included in the lot.
