Harriet Derbyshire

Harriet Derbyshire (c.1893-1919) worked for Torchwood's branch in Cardiff in 1918.

Unusually for a woman of her time, she had a degree in physics from the University of Oxford. (WEB: torchwood.org.uk)

In June 1918, she and Gerald Kneale investigated alleged "hauntings" (actually time shifts from 90 years in the future) at St Teilo's Hospital in Cardiff. They both escorted Tommy Brockless out of his ward to ensure his cryogenic freezing and returned the "future" Tommy back to his native time so as to ensure that history would take its proper course. She died one year later at the age of twenty-six while in active service. (TW: To the Last Man) She worked alongside Jack Harkness. (TWM: Rift War!)


 * As a physicist, Derbyshire might have had a hand in the creation of the Rift Manipulator, which is known to have been under construction circa 1913.

She asked and received a favour from a British Army officer: she wanted to borrow a tank and travelled to 2008 to use it. (TWM: Rift War!)

Following her death in 1919, Derbysire's body remained in cryogenic suspension in the morgue in the Hub, in Bay 15. (WEB: torchwood.org.uk) Whether her body was destroyed along with the rest of the Hub in 2009 is unknown. (TW: Children of Earth: Day One)

Behind the scenes

 * Unintentionally or otherwise, Harriet Derbyshire has the same last name as Delia Derbyshire, the electronic music pioneer associated with Doctor Who.