The baby pictured doing a victory V-sign in the womb

But any worries that Ed and Dee Parsons may have harboured quickly faded when they saw their baby in the womb at 20 weeks.

The child was making an unmistakable V-sign – the victory gesture associated with Winston Churchill and, latterly, with world peace. 

‘The sonographer couldn't believe it – she said she had never seen anything like it before,’ said Mrs Parsons, 35. 

‘It’s nice to have such an iconic image of peace when there’s so much unrest all around us. It was very reassuring.

She said she and her husband, also 35, were feeling weighed down by negative global events and the death of someone close to them. 

‘We were thinking, we’re bringing this child into the world at such a horrible time,’ she added. ‘But then this happened, we couldn’t quite believe what we were seeing. 

'All our friends said they thought it was such a positive, happy symbol.’

The couple, who live in Godalming, Surrey, and run an event production business, are thinking of calling the baby Winston if it is a boy.

‘It’s growing on us,’ Mrs Parsons said. ‘But for now we are calling it peace-baby, that’s our nickname.’

Mrs Parsons, who has a daughter, Grace, six, from a previous marriage, said that in the 12-week scan the child had given a clear thumbs-up.

Churchill is reported to have once said: ‘All babies look like me. But then, I look like all babies.’

(dailymail.co.uk)