Torchwood Institute

Summary
The Torchwood Institute was founded in or about the year 1879 by royal decree from Queen Victoria, in response to an encounter with the Doctor and a cult of monks who were harboring a werewolf. While she was grateful for the Doctor and Rose's assistance in defeating the werewolf, the incident also made her aware of otherworldly threats to the British Empire, and thus ordered that Torchwood be established in order to defend against them-- specifically from the Doctor. Seeing his power and knowledge, the Queen was wary of any possible threat he could cause to the Empire. The name of the Institute was drawn from the Torchwood Estate, where most of the adventure took place. (Tooth and Claw)

Over time, the Institute accumulated much alien technology, reverse-engineering it and applying it to secret military projects within the British army. Within Torchwood an unofficial slogan evolved: "If it's alien, it's ours."

Hiding out in the open, what most of the British populace believed was a tower of banking offices was in fact Torchwood Tower, built to more readily access a weak point in spacetime. The Torchwood Tower was itself only part of a much larger plan involving free energy that backfired horribly. (Army of Ghosts)

The Christmas Invasion
On Christmas of 2005, an alien race known as the Sycorax attempted an invasion of Earth, using a form of mind control that connected to everyone on the planet that had A+ blood. Torchwood was preparing a weapon for just such a contingency, based on alien technlology that they had scavenged approximately ten years before. They had also developed advanced alien language translation software, lending it surreptitiously to the British army, which aided in communication with the Sycorax. After a pitched encounter with the Doctor, the Sycorax were forced to retreat. The Torchwood Weapon came online as they were fleeing, and the Prime Minister, who apparently had always known of Torchwood's existance, ordered it to fire. The alien ship was destroyed instantly, much to the ire of the Doctor. In retaliation he started false rumors against the Prime Minister, who did not acknowledge Torchwood publicly yet, but stood in defence of both her order to fire as well as Torchwood's activities.

The energy weapon that destroyed the Sycorax ship has no formal name to date, referred to synonymously with Torchwood.

Recent History
Sometime in 2006, the Institute recovered a large black sphere of obviously alien design that registered as having no mass, no energy, no physical data whatsoever. The retrieval of this item, later to be revealed as a Void Ship, was in conjunction with Torchwood experiments involving a 'hole' in spacetime. After experimenting with the 'hole', it was discovered that tapping into the resonance around it could provide massive amounts of what they believed was free energy. A side-effect of these experiments was the appearance of millions of 'ghosts' all over the world; humanoid figures that seemed to glow with an unearthly light.

It was at this point that The Doctor became involved, and explained to the then-administrator Yvonne Hartman that their experiments were in fact weakening the barrier between dimensions, which would eventually lead to dramatic problems in their own world, perhaps even resulting in the collapse of their dimension altogether. His warnings were not heeded, and the experiments continued. As a result, a massive invasion force from another dimension came through the 'hole', allowing the Earth to be conquered by the Cybermen for approximately an hour.

At the same time, the Void Ship opened, revealing a hidden cadre of Daleks. Four Daleks, members of the secret Cult of Skaro, had come to Earth to help restore the Dalek race using a stolen piece of Time Lord technology called the Genesis Ark. They promptly killed a Torchwood technician while stealing his knowledge of current events, and seeing the Cybermen as an impediment to their own return, they began a war against them, despite an offer from the Cyber Leader to form an alliance.

The 'hole' in spacetime created by the Void Ship also allowed a resistance army from another dimension to cross over, initially with the intention of stopping the Cybermen. However with the advance of the Daleks, a rather sudden and uneasy truce began, with Torchwood militia men, the other-dimensional resistance fighters, and the Cybermen all fighting together against the Daleks. This turned the Torchwood Tower into a battleground, and the fighting did not stop until The Doctor found a way to intervene, reversing Torchwood's power machinery and sending the Daleks and Cybermen into the Void. (Doomsday)

While a majority of the Torchwood administration were either killed or 'upgraded' by the Cybermen, it is believed that the organization will remain.

Administrators and Staff
Yvonne Hartman was the administrator of Torchwood in 2006 during the Cybermen incursion and the Dalek conflict. She oversaw the projects that included the Void Ship, as well as the power experiment that ultimately resulted in the Cybermen's invasion. She held a great admiration for The Doctor, however she was confident in the righteousness of Torchwood's actions to the point of fault, ignoring his recomendations and warnings. Only when the end was near did she attempt to stop the experiments, only to have her orders overridden by staff who had been secretly 'upgraded' by the Cybermen.

She was fiercely patriotic, and believed that Torchwood's work was vital to the survival of the 'British Empire', and was assured that their work would in fact lead to the restoration of Britain to the status of empire. Ultimately, she was seized by the Cybermen and led off to be 'upgraded', and while she was tear-stricken, she walked into the chamber without coercion, claiming that she "did (her) duty for Queen and Country".

She performed one last known service; even after being 'upgraded' by the Cybermen, her apparent pride and sense of duty was so strong that it overrode the behaviour protocols and allowed her to fend off the Cybermen approaching the top offices, giving The Doctor and Rose time to seal the breach between worlds. She is assumed dead.

Other members

 * Doctor Rajesh Singh
 * Adeola Oshodi

Real-world Connections
'Torchwood' was a code name for the new series of Doctor Who when it was in production, partly to keep it secret, partly to keep people from absconding with tapes of it before it was produced. The word 'Torchwood' itself is an anagram of 'Doctor Who'.

'Torchwood' will also be the name of a spin-off series from the BBC set in the Doctor Who universe.

See also Torchwood.