- You may be looking for Victoria Waterfield, the Second Doctor's companion or any one of several other things named "Victoria".
Victoria, Queen of Great Britain and Ireland, Empress of India and Defender of the Faith, was an influential monarch on Earth in the 19th century, ruling from 1837 to 1901. Her reign, known as the Victorian era, was marked by tremendous strides in technology and the arts in Britain and elsewhere. Victoria met the Doctor at least twice; she met him during her coronation ceremony in 1838, and in 1879 she experienced an adventure with the Tenth Doctor. The latter led to her effectively banishing the Doctor from her country and forming the Torchwood Institute as the British Empire's defence against the dark forces with which the Doctor seemed to consort.
Biography
The Third Doctor claimed to have attended Queen Victoria's coronation in 1838. (TV: The Curse of Peladon)
In 1863, the Fifth Doctor was temporarily appointed Queen Victoria's scientific advisor while investigating a recently-discovered rift that appeared to lead to the afterlife; in fact, it actually led to another dimension which shaped itself according to the wishes of the inhabitants. (PROSE: Empire of Death)
Queen Victoria's late husband Prince Albert had known Sir George MacLeish, the owner of Torchwood House. (TV: Tooth and Claw)
In 1878, Queen Victoria oversaw the Cygnus, the Draco and the Lynx, which were launched to the Moon. This resulted in the alien life-forms known as the Vrall being unleashed on Earth. The Fifth Doctor had his companion Kamelion pose as a vision of Albert to convince Victoria to abandon space travel. (PROSE: Imperial Moon)
In the summer of 1879, Queen Victoria celebrated her Diamond Jubilee. Count Otto Von Harnstein presented her with the Giant's Heart which was housed in the Tower of London until it could be set into her crown. The Giant's Heart was taken by the Doctor and replaced with a similar looking diamond from the Mines of Horno Ciego. The Doctor believed Queen Victoria would not notice the difference. (PROSE: The Giant's Heart)
Later that same year, Queen Victoria met the Tenth Doctor and Rose Tyler, and saw on the former's psychic paper that he had been assigned as her protector. They stayed the night at Torchwood House, where Father Angelo and the Brethren, who stopped her train so that she would come there, unleashed an alien werewolf on her, their intention being to take over the throne and create the Empire of the Wolf, and guarded the house from outside to prevent escape. The Queen killed Angelo with a pistol, though claimed that Captain Reynolds did so when asked about it. Though the werewolf killed almost everyone in the house, the Doctor and Rose used a light chamber created by the late Prince Albert and George MacLeish, powered by moonlight to kill it, before it could kill them or the Queen. The Queen knighted both Rose Tyler and the Tenth Doctor for saving her, before having an abrupt change of heart and banished the Doctor from the British Empire, never to return; she found it worrying how much fun they found in a life of terror and blasphemy, and wanted nothing more to do with it, ordering them to leave her world and never return. Shortly after, she founded the Torchwood Institute, taking the name from the estate where she encountered the Doctor. Despite his having saved her life, Victoria had the Doctor listed as "an enemy of the Crown" in Torchwood's original charter, (TV: Tooth and Claw) as related by Yvonne Hartman. (TV: Army of Ghosts)
The Queen seemed very guarded about a bite the werewolf may have given her, leading Rose and the Doctor to jokingly speculate that the werewolf curse was subsequently passed down through the royal line. (TV: Tooth and Claw)
Four years later, in 1883, the being calling itself Josiah Samuel Smith trained the deranged Redvers Fenn-Cooper as an assassin to kill the Queen. Cooper had an invitation to visit Buckingham Palace to meet the Queen, so Smith saw him as the perfect assassin to kill her, which would enable Smith to take over the throne. Fenn-Cooper believed the monarch to be a wild animal called the "Crowned Saxe-Coburg". (TV: Ghost Light)
In 1889, Li H'sen Chang was scheduled to perform for Queen Victoria at Buckingham Palace but he was killed one month earlier. (TV: The Talons of Weng-Chiang)
In the 49th century, refugees who had escaped from a dying world projected their consciousnesses through time and made contact with a spiritualist named Mrs Vanguard in the 1890s, passing themselves off as ghosts. They planned to transfer their consciousnesses into the bodies of influential people in 1890s London with their ultimate goal to take control of Queen Victoria. From the historical records, they were aware that she was still in mourning for her long deceased husband Prince Albert. The refugee possessing the body of Henry Gordon Jago mentioned that, in decades to come, there would be "brutal, terrible wars which will determine the fate of this planet." With one of their kind possessing Queen Victoria's body, they intended to "turn the tides of history" and create a new future, thereby preventing the destruction of their world. Their plan was defeated by Jago, Professor George Litefoot, Ellie Higson and Toby. (AUDIO: The Spirit Trap)
She once attended a play at the New Regency Theatre, which was a source of great pride to Jago, its owner and proprietor. (AUDIO: The Theatre of Dreams) She was saved from Jack the Ripper by Henry Gordon Jago and George Litefoot, and gave them a royal pardon. (AUDIO: The Wax Princess)
She did not support women's suffrage. She once stated, "Let women be what God intended: a helpmate for man." (AUDIO: The Suffering)
On 17 May 1899, Queen Victoria visited Torchwood One's base at the National History Museum in London for an annual inspection when an alien creature which fed on youth escaped and started attacking people. Despite her advanced age, the Queen took to pursuing the creature alongside Jack Harkness, she would infact realise that its weakness was the elderly who lacked youth. She initially considered using the creature to prolong her own life abundantly due to her lack of faith in her future successors to oversee Torchwood. Ultimately, however, she relented and stopped the creature by rallying elderly Londoners to surround it, granting them all minutely prolonged lives while the creature was reduced to dust. Following this adventure, Victoria decided to allow the Torchwood Institute to continue operating as well opting to retire from the public view. (AUDIO: The Victorian Age)
Towards the end of her life, Queen Victoria met Agnes Havisham before she was cryogenically preserved to act as Torchwood's Assessor. (PROSE: Risk Assessment)
Legacy
Victoria was succeeded as the British monarch by her son Edward VII. (TV: Inferno)
Knowledge of the Doctor passed down from one generation to another in the Royal Family following the incident with the werewolf and exile by Queen Victoria, being remembered as far as the 33rd century by Elizabeth X of Starship UK. (TV: The Beast Below)
Even 100 years after her death, the phrase "We are not amused" was still often linked to Queen Victoria; this led to Rose Tyler, who met her in 1879, making a wager with the Doctor that she could make her say it. (TV: Tooth and Claw)
Following her encounter with the werewolf, Queen Victoria founded Torchwood; Torchwood still existed even in the 42nd century. (TV: The Satan Pit)
Minor references
Upon visiting Venus in the far future, Henry Gordon Jago suggested claiming the planet for Queen Victoria and the British Empire. (AUDIO: Voyage to Venus)
When the Fourth Doctor mentioned the dress Sarah Jane Smith was wearing was also worn by the Doctor's former travelling companion Victoria, Sarah, referencing Queen Victoria's husband, quipped "Well, I hope Albert didn't wear it." (TV: Pyramids of Mars)
There was a statue of Queen Victoria in the garden of Harrison Chase's mansion. (TV: The Seeds of Doom)
When they travelled to Mars, British soldiers took a painting of her to the red planet, putting it on display while they mined the area. They later marked it as her territory by writing "God save the Queen" on the surface with rocks with the Twelfth Doctor and Bill's help. (TV: Empress of Mars)
Behind the scenes
- According to the reference book Doctor Who: Creatures and Demons, which is not a valid source for in-universe articles, in Pete's World, Queen Victoria still went to Torchwood House. The Werewolf attacked the house and Queen Victoria was killed in this event. It was theorised this was the point of divergence which created Pete's World.
- Queen Victoria is one of three historical figures who are avaliable as playable characters in the online game TARDIS Tennis.
- Beginning in 2016, Jenna Coleman played Queen Victoria in the ITV drama series, Victoria, which chronicled the early years of the eponymous Queen's reign and also starred Eve Myles, Tommy Knight, Adrian Schiller, Tom Price, Nichola McAuliffe, Peter Bowles, Simon Paisley Day, Robin Soans and David Bamber.
External links
- December 1899 address of Queen Victoria to the Torchwood Institute (Torchwood website)
- August 1883 address to the Torchwood Institute on the Cardiff rift (Torchwood website)
- December 1884 address on the importance of secrecy (Torchwood website)
- July 1882 speech to the Torchwood Institute (Torchwood website)
- account of Queen Victoria's visits to Torchwood House (Torchwood House website)
