Trafalgar Square

Trafalgar Square was a large square in the middle of London. According to the Fourth Doctor, "a good protest always ends up in Trafalgar Square." (AUDIO: Energy of the Daleks) It consisted of Nelson's Column and three lion statues. There was also a fourth, empty plinth; in the 21st century, arts were periodically shown off there. (PROSE: Magic of the Angels) Harry Sullivan, upon experiencing his first voyage in the TARDIS, noted that the ship would be incredibly useful in Trafalgar Square, "hundreds of bobbies hiding inside it." (TV: The Ark in Space)
Crowds traditionally gathered at Trafalgar Square on New Year's Eve. (AUDIO: The Paradise of Death)
== Locations ==
It was adjacent to Whitcomb Street and Charing Cross tube station. (AUDIO: The Year of the Bat)
== History ==
=== 17th century ===
On a visit to London in November 1605, the First Doctor's companion Vicki Pallister, a native of the 25th century, expressed an interest in visiting the square. When the Doctor told her that the Battle of Trafalgar would not occur for another 200 years, she assumed that he meant that a battle had been fought in Trafalgar Square in 1805. (PROSE: The Plotters)
=== 19th century ===
On 23 October 1843, the Fifth Doctor, Nyssa and Tegan Jovanka visited the square, which Tegan claimed was more "tourist friendly" in 1982. The Doctor climbed Nelson's Column and found its builders Samuel Morton Peto and Thomas Grissell had been taken over by two Sevakrill. In addition, they had installed a missile inside the column which was faced downwards, ready to destroy the Earth in 2017. This would distract the Charnal horde, enemies of the Sevakrill, allowing them to gain a strategic advantage.
To protect this operation, they installed several stone lions, made invisible by perception filters. These lions began chasing Nyssa and Tegan. In the process, they killed seven civilians and a policeman. The Doctor managed to appeal to Peto and Grissell and they broke free. The lions returned to their plinths and the Doctor hoped that, when their perception filters wore off in a few decades, Sir Edwin Landseer would unveil them as his own creation, as was the case. The Doctor then spent two weeks lowering the missile into a shaft beneath column and building a floor to cover it. By this time it was November, and the statue of Nelson was being added when the Doctor departed. He left behind a short range sensor in the square to warn him if the Sevakrill ever tried to reactivate the missile. (AUDIO: The Lions of Trafalgar)
In 1867, Henry Gordon Jago and George Litefoot ended up in Trafalgar Square after Wyld's Great Globe was dislodged and rolled down Whitcomb Street to the Square, before resting at the gate of Charing Cross tube station. (AUDIO: The Year of the Bat)
In 1887, Sherlock Holmes and John Watson passed quickly through the square and up Charing Cross Road on their way to Baker Street. (PROSE: All-Consuming Fire)
In the same year, three protesters were killed by the police during the Bloody Sunday demonstration in Trafalgar Square and many more were injured. (AUDIO: Children of Steel)
=== 20th century ===
In 1926, the Metropolitan Police Service turned the Sevakrill sensor left by the Fifth Doctor into a police box. (PROSE: The Lions of Trafalgar)
On 8 May 1945, a party was held in Trafalgar Square to celebrate VE Day. (PROSE: Magic of the Angels) The Seventh Doctor and his companions Ace and Hex were present in London for the celebrations. Prior to this visit, Hex had never heard of VE Day. (AUDIO: Casualties of War)
Amy Pond and the Eleventh Doctor were relieved to see Sylvia alive in an intact Trafalgar Square in 1963 after they restored the timeline and defeated the Daleks. (GAME: City of the Daleks)
On 23 November 1963, a man was murdered in an alley near Trafalgar Square. His murderer was never identified. (AUDIO: 1963)
On 26 June 1965, (PROSE: The Time Travellers) Ian Chesterton and Barbara Wright visited the Square while sightseeing upon their return to Earth following two years of travelling with the First Doctor. (TV: The Chase)
The TARDIS materialised in Trafalgar Square immediately after midnight, 1 January 1966, during the New Year's Eve celebrations. (TV: The Daleks' Master Plan)
In 1976, the Seventh Doctor arrived in the square with Ace and Bernice Summerfield, disguising his TARDIS as Nelson's Column by materialising around the actual monument. The Monk caused the TARDIS to take on the form of the Statue of Liberty. (PROSE: No Future)
On 31 December 1999, crowds massed at Trafalgar Square to celebrate the New Year and millennium. (PROSE: Millennial Rites, PROSE: The Novel of the Film)
=== 21st century ===
Mickey Smith enjoyed a lunch with his girlfriend, Rose Tyler, in Trafalgar Square on 4 March 2005. (TV: Rose)
The Ninth Doctor once parked the TARDIS right by Nelson's Column in Trafalgar Square, in the presence of Rose Tyler. He later noted that no one really took notice. (COMIC: The Love Invasion)
On the night of 25 December 2006, many Londoners went to Trafalgar Square to celebrate "just being alive" following the destruction of the Sycorax spaceship above the Earth earlier that day. Among them were members of the group that would later be called LINDA. The newly regenerated Tenth Doctor observed these celebrations where, unbeknownst to him, he was caught in one of the many pictures taken by Ursula, who did not realise his significance until fellow LINDA member Colin Skinner pointed him out. (TV: Love & Monsters)
The Tenth Doctor pulled the interstellar cruise ship Titanic out of a nosedive, narrowly avoiding Buckingham Palace and piloted her along the Mall toward Trafalgar Square, on the morning of 25 December 2008. (TV: Voyage of the Damned)
In 2012, the Eleventh Doctor put two quantum-locked Weeping Angels on the fourth plinth, under the title of "Monument to the Missing" in memory of the Angel's victims, where the two Angels would be in someone's line of vision for many years to come. (PROSE: Magic of the Angels)
In 2013, (COMIC: The Fractures) a UNIT helicopter brought the Doctor's TARDIS to Trafalgar Square to visit the Under Gallery, beneath the National Gallery building. (TV: The Day of the Doctor) The Eleventh Doctor noted that Nelson had seen "better days", as had his weathered old column. (PROSE: The Day of the Doctor)
In 2014, (COMIC: The Fractures) a forest grew overnight to protect Earth from a massive solar flare. During a school trip, the Coal Hill student Maebh Arden got lost in the brand new woods and was to be found in Trafalgar Square by her teachers and the Twelfth Doctor. (TV: In the Forest of the Night)
In 2015, after the Talent Scout stole the Eleventh Doctor's TARDIS, John Jones chased the TARDIS through Trafalgar Square while riding the Entity. (COMIC: The Comfort of the Good)
On 30 January 2025, the Fourth Doctor and Leela attended an energy activist protest, led by Jack Coulson, against the GlobeSphere Corporation in Trafalgar Square. (AUDIO: Energy of the Daleks)
By the late 21st century, a T-Mat cubicle was installed in Trafalgar Square, just north of Nelson's Column. (TV: The Seeds of Death)
=== 22nd century ===
During the Dalek occupation of Earth in the 2160s, the Daleks patrolled the square. Barbara Wright and Jenny managed to avoid the Daleks while rolling Dortmun in his wheelchair in their trek across Westminster to Wembley. (TV: The Dalek Invasion of Earth)
=== 25th century ===
The First Doctor's companion Vicki Pallister, a native of the 25th century, was unfamiliar with Trafalgar Square's history. (PROSE: The Plotters)
While he was busy repairing a circle of transmat refractors on Earth, the Fourth Doctor pointed out to Sarah Jane Smith and Harry Sullivan that Trafalgar Square "should be that way", if the desolate part of Earth they had transmatted to was Piccadilly ten thousand years into Sarah and Harry's future. He told Sarah to "mind the traffic." (TV: The Sontaran Experiment)
== Other realities ==
=== City of the Daleks ===
The Eleventh Doctor and Amy Pond arrived in the Square in 1963 to learn that the Daleks had invaded Earth. The Daleks were chasing the last human through the square. The timeline was restored when the TARDIS crew travelled to Skaro to destroy the Eye of Time. (GAME: City of the Daleks)
== Behind the scenes ==
In the ultimately unproduced film The Dark Dimension, the Daleks were to have been among several alien races which simultaneously invade London, with one particular scene depicting them gliding round the lions at Trafalgar Square.
Category:London landmarks
Category:Locations visited by the First Doctor
Category:Locations visited by the Fourth Doctor
Category:Locations visited by the Fifth Doctor
Category:Locations visited by the Sixth Doctor
Category:Locations visited by the Seventh Doctor
Category:Locations visited by the Ninth Doctor
Category:Locations visited by the Tenth Doctor
Category:Locations visited by the Eleventh Doctor
Category:Locations visited by the Twelfth Doctor
Category:Political activism
Category:Locations from the real world
Category:London squares and plazas