Mary McCartney is born

Paul and Linda McCartney’s first daughter Mary Anna McCartney was born on this day.

Mary was named after Paul’s mother, who had died in 1956. She was born at 1.30am at the Avenue Clinic in north London, and weighed 6lb 8oz.

Linda had been four months pregnant when she and Paul married. She also had a seven-year-old daughter, Heather, from her previous marriage, who Paul adopted in 1969.

As our relationship solidified and we really started to feel very confident with each other, it was a question of ‘Well, shall I get off the pill then?’ and we talked about that, and I said, ‘Yeah!’ I don’t know why. It wasn’t like planning a family, it was more ‘If you like. We could see what happened. If anything happened. That would be all right.’ Then Mary was on the way, it was definitely not planned. And we decided, round about that point, to get married.

The Avenue Clinic stood at 12 Avenue Road in St John’s Wood, London, until its demolition in 1985. Paul and Linda’s son James was also born at the clinic on 12 September 1977.