David Cameron - Personal Life

Personal Life

Samantha Gwendoline Sheffield, the daughter of Sir Reginald Adrian Berkeley Sheffield, 8th Baronet and Annabel Lucy Veronica Jones (now Viscountess Astor), was a Marlborough College school friend of Cameron's sister Clare. The couple first met at a party at the Cameron's family house when Samantha was 16. After graduating from Bristol School of Creative Arts, Clare invited Samantha on a Cameron family holiday in Tuscany, Italy, where the couple's romance started. They married on 1 June 1996 at the Church of St. Augustine of Canterbury, East Hendred, Oxfordshire, five years before he became an MP.

The Camerons have had four children. Their first child, Ivan Reginald Ian, was born on 8 April 2002 in Hammersmith and Fulham, London, with a rare combination of cerebral palsy and a form of severe epilepsy called Ohtahara syndrome, requiring round-the-clock care. Recalling the receipt of this news, Cameron is quoted as saying: "The news hits you like a freight train...You are depressed for a while because you are grieving for the difference between your hopes and the reality. But then you get over that, because he's wonderful." Ivan died at St Mary's Hospital, Paddington, London, on 25 February 2009, aged six.

David and Samantha Cameron have two daughters, Nancy Gwen (born 2004), and Florence Rose Endellion (born 24 August 2010), and a son, Arthur Elwen (born 2006). Cameron took paternity leave when his second son was born, and this decision received broad coverage. It was also stated that Cameron would be taking paternity leave after his second daughter was born. His second daughter, Florence Rose Endellion, was born on 24 August 2010, three weeks prematurely, while the family was on holiday in Cornwall. Her third given name, Endellion, is taken from the village of St Endellion near where the Camerons were holidaying.

A Daily Mail article from June 2007 quoted Sunday Times Rich List compiler Philip Beresford, who had valued the Conservative Leader for the first time, as saying: "I put the combined family wealth of David and Samantha Cameron at £30 million plus. Both sides of the family are extremely wealthy." Another estimate is £3.2 million, though this figure excludes the million-pound legacies Cameron is expected to inherit from both sides of his family.

In early May 2008, David Cameron decided to enrol his daughter Nancy at a State school. The Camerons had been attending its associated church, which is near the Cameron family home in North Kensington, for three years. Cameron's constituency home is in Dean, Oxfordshire, and the Camerons are key members of the Chipping Norton set.

On 8 September 2010 it was announced that Cameron would miss Prime Minister's Questions in order to fly to southern France to see his father, Ian Cameron, who had suffered a stroke with coronary complications. Later that day, with David and other family members at his bedside, Ian died. On 17 September 2010, Cameron attended a private ceremony for the funeral of his father in Berkshire, which prevented him from hearing the address of The Pope to Westminster Hall, an occasion he would otherwise have attended.

Cameron supports Aston Villa Football Club.