1899 1899 was the final year of the 19th century . The Sixth Doctor regarded 1899 as a time when London was extremely elegant , with " garden parties , Henley Regatta , society balls , and country - house weekends " . ( PROSE : " Players " ) During this year , Great Britain was defended from alien attacks numerous times by both Torchwood Three ( TV : " Fragments " et al ) and Jago and Litefoot . ( AUDIO : " The Justice of Jalxar " , " The Carrionite Curse " ) Dated events . Early in the year , Jack Harkness was recruited by Torchwood Three . ( TV : " Fragments " ) On 17 May , the director of Torchwood Three was killed by a youth - sucking alien . Shortly afterwards , Queen Victoria came to conduct her annual assessment of Torchwood . She pursued the alien across Cardiff with Jack Harkness and eventually aged it to death by forcing it to suck the life - force of a group of elderly people . ( AUDIO : " The Victorian Age " ) During the summer , the Sixth Doctor and Peri Brown came to South Africa just after the Boer War started . They met the young reporter Winston Churchill . As part of a temporal game played by the Player s , an assassin was sent to kill Churchill so he wouldn ' t become a Prime Minister . The Doctor and Peri saved Churchill , but they were caught by the Boers and imprisoned in Pretoria . With the help of the Countes , the Doctor , Peri , and Churchill escaped . The Doctor and Peri left in the TARDIS while Churchill fled to Mozambique . ( PROSE : " Players " ) In early November , Noël Coward was born . ( PROSE : " Who Killed Kennedy " ) On 26 December , the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa watched a Boxing Day mummers play in Stockbridge . The play recalled events in 1199 that the Doctor and Nyssa were soon to live through : overthrowing the Rutan s who inhabited Stockbridge Castle . The actor who played the dragon recalled his ancestor ' s experiences , and went mad . ( AUDIO : " Castle of Fear " ) On 31 December , the Torchwood One agent Gerald Kneale assisted Torchwood Three with the Centurian Incident and its clean - up in Cardiff . ( COMIC : " Rift War ! Part Six : Circles " ) Undated events . The Fourth Doctor and Romana encountered Henry Gordon Jago , Professor George Litefoot and the Pugilist and fought Harvey Marsh in London . ( AUDIO : " The Justice of Jalxar " ) A Q7 starship carrying Jata crashed in Wyoming . Jata allied himself with Clint Currie and helped mastermind a number of big - time robberies . With the help of Molly Zook , the Twelfth Doctor caught Currie and took Jata back to Osumare in his TARDIS . ( COMIC : " From the Horse ' s Mouth " ) Reverend Wainwright ' s father translated the Viking rune inscriptions in his church , concluding that a great evil was buried in its grounds . ( TV : " The Curse of Fenric " ) Godfathers Morlock and Sabbath of Faction Paradox came to a rural English village to conduct part of a ritual to prevent any enemies of the Faction from altering Sabbath ' s timeline . By killing his great - grandmother Fiora Venn , Sabbath would prevent the birth of his grandfather and " cast himself adrift in history " . However , the Godfathers found that they had arrived four weeks after the conception of Sabbath ' s grandfather . As killing Venn at this time could erase Sabbath from history , Sabbath killed Venn ' s niece Emma James to continue the ritual . James ' best friend Justine McManus witnessed the murder and was recruited by Morlock into Faction Paradox . ( AUDIO : " Movers " , " A Labyrinth of Histories " ) W . G . Grace played his last cricket match at Trent Bridge . ( AUDIO : " The Havoc of Empires " ) Henry Gordon Jago and Professor George Litefoot had an encounter with witches . Jago was able to defeat them with his large vocabulary . ( AUDIO : " The Carrionite Curse " ) Maurice and Beatrice were born . ( AUDIO : " The Haunting of Malkin Place " )