But he believed he would scrape home with only a slender majority of maybe ten MPs.

And as he awaited his fate on Thursday evening, sitting in Mrs Thatcher’s old study on the first floor of 10 Downing Street, it was the spectre of another female Tory leader that haunted him.

Despite having run a sophisticated data-driven campaign, months in the planning and ruthlessly executed, he could not escape the fear he might repeat Theresa May’s 2017 Election disaster.

But before long, Mr Johnson was heralded the most successful Tory leader in a generation, thanks to a remarkable result that saw old party allegiances ripped up, Labour strongholds obliterated and the people’s decision to leave the EU finally cemented.