I
t was a privilege having your picture taken by Tom. He
was quiet and unassuming, but of course you knew about
his incredible track record and the work he had done over
decades, from war zones to intimate pictures of public
figures. He would never boast about them; indeed, you had to
drag the stories out of him.
Tom had an extraordinary ability to capture the moment,
whether it was following you for a day as prime minister through
all sorts of situations, from trips to Afghanistan to the rigours of
the campaign trail, or taking a more formal portrait. He once caught
Florence sitting in my prime ministerial red box in the Downing
Street flat (after I had disastrously cut her fringe) — and looking at
the picture always makes me laugh. I feel very spoilt to have such
an album of Tom’s pictures from her early years, whether in a baby
sling while I am making a phone call, or at Chequers, or what was
her home for the first six years of her life, 10 Downing Street.
Some photographers seem to need to get in your face (and
therefore get in the way). Not Tom. When he captured images of
team meetings in No 10, or my first meeting with Barack Obama
in the cloisters of parliament, you hardly knew he was there.
The photograph he took of our family sitting on a sofa in our
home in London when I was leader of the opposition is one of my
most treasured possessions. It hangs on our bedroom wall — and in
the age-old cliché of “which one possession would you rescue in a
fire?”, it would be this. Our son Ivan was profoundly disabled,
frequently racked with seizures and needed calm around him. Tom
was gentle and thoughtful — and managed to get this wonderful
image as Ivan and I looked into each other’s eyes, with Elwen
shouting, Nancy in a Cinderella dress holding a balloon and
Samantha radiating calm control. For me it sums up the warmth,
love and chaos of our early family life. And it reminds me that, for
all the struggles of bringing up a very disabled child, his years with
us were a blessing that we will never forget. Of course there are
always the pictures in your mind’s eye — and fortunately they
never fade — but Tom’s black-and-white image brings everything
back so vividly and completely nRight: David and Samantha
Cameron with their children, Ivan,
Elwen and Nancy, photographed
at home in 2008. Ivan, who had
cerebral palsy and severe
epilepsy, died the following year
at the age of six. Below: Tom
Stoddart, who died in NovemberAbove: Cameron’s
youngest daughter,
Florence, sits in his
prime ministerial
red box in October
2011, sporting a DIY
haircut by her fatherLeft: Cameron
walks with Florence
in the grounds of
Chequers,
photographed for
a November 2011
cover of this
magazine“Tom was gentle and
thoughtful with Ivan”
By David Cameron
The Sunday Times Magazine • 39