Samantha Cameron leaves Cornwall hospital with new baby daughter

A people carrier with blacked-out windows takes prime minister David Cameron, wife Samantha and their newborn baby away from the Royal Cornwall hospital in Truro. Photograph: Kirsty Wigglesworth/AP

August 27, 2010

(KATAKAMI / GUARDIAN.CO.UK) — David Cameron’s wife, Samantha, left the Royal Cornwall hospital in Truro this morning with the couple’s new daughter, Florence Rose Endellion.

She was driven from the rear of the hospital’s maternity unit in a black people carrier without waiting photographers, TV cameras and reporters catching a glimpse of the new baby.

A hospital spokesman confirmed that Mrs Cameron had been discharged after a third night at the Royal Cornwall.

The baby was born at the hospital on Tuesday after making an unexpected early appearance during the prime minister’s family holiday in Cornwall.

Florence, whose third name is a tribute to the north Cornish village of St Endellion, near where the Camerons were staying, weighed 2.7kg (6lb 1oz) and was born by caesarean section. Her sister Nancy, six, and brother Arthur, four, visited the new arrival in hospital yesterday.

Congratulations have been received from the Queen, Gordon and Sarah Brown and French president Nicolas Sarkozy among many others.

Deputy prime minister Nick Clegg said Cameron had not yet decided when he would be returning to his desk in Downing Street.

The prime minister had been expected to be back at No 10 next week following his two-week holiday, but Clegg said he would now want to take some paternity leave.

“I spoke to him just after the birth of his baby daughter,” Clegg told the London radio station LBC 97.3. “We haven’t yet spoken about exactly what date he is returning.

“He obviously wants to take some time off, like any young dad does, for paternity leave and I will just carry on holding the fort.”