Jamie McCrimmon
- You may be looking for the version of Jamie created by Zoe Heriot.
James Robert "Jamie" McCrimmon was a Highland Scot from the mid-18th century who travelled with the Second Doctor, Polly Wright, Ben Jackson, Victoria Waterfield and Zoe Heriot. He also had a couple of adventures with Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (TV: The Web of Fear, TV: The Invasion) as well as the Sixth Doctor and Peri Brown. (TV: The Two Doctors, COMIC: The World Shapers)
Jamie travelled in the TARDIS for most of the Doctor's second incarnation. His journeys through time and space began not long after the Doctor's first regeneration (TV: The Tenth Planet) and continued until the Time Lords sentenced the Doctor to exile on Earth. Jamie was returned to 18th century Scotland by the Time Lords, with the memory of all but his first adventure with the Doctor erased. (TV: The War Games)
Whether the Time Lords' memory removal actually held was not well understood. It was posited that he travelled alone with the Second Doctor (COMIC: Invasion of the Quarks, et al) and that he did so when he was clearly middle-aged (TV: The Two Doctors) — neither of which happened prior to his Time Lord-enforced return to Scotland. By 1788, the second mindwipe was still intact and he then chose to forget again in possibly a third mindwipe. (AUDIO: The Glorious Revolution) Another account held that as an old man he had overcome the mindwipe, as the Time Lords held an imperfect understanding of the human mind. This was prior to having an adventure with the Sixth Doctor in which he gave his life saving the universe from Cybermen. (COMIC: The World Shapers)
Biography
Early life
Jamie was born in 1724 to Donald McCrimmon. (AUDIO: Shadow of Death)
Jamie learned to play the chanter at his father's knee from an early age and became a talented piper like his father and grandfather before him. (TV: The Highlanders) He grew up with his father and brothers, and they did some farming. He idolised Scottish heroes such as William Wallace. (PROSE: On a Pedestal)
Jamie and his father used to go grouse hunting in the Highlands. (PROSE: The Nameless City)
By the 18th century, Jamie's family had been making haggis for hundreds of years. (AUDIO: Echoes of Grey)
He did not know how to write. (PROSE: The Lost)
Travels
The Doctor, Ben and Polly
Jamie, then 22 years old, (AUDIO: Shadow of Death) first met the Second Doctor in the aftermath of the English defeat of the Jacobite Rebellion at the Battle of Culloden on 16 April 1746, when he was a piper for the Clan McLaren. Jamie and his fellow Highlanders faced being hanged, butchered by the Duke of Cumberland or sold into unsurvivable seven-year servitude on the plantations in the West Indies. After escaping the gallows, an unsure Jamie was urged to follow the Doctor, Ben Jackson and Polly Wright into the mysterious TARDIS. (TV: The Highlanders)
When he and the others visited Atlantis, Jamie and Ben were sent to the mines, but they escaped with the help of fellow prisoners Sean and Jacko. When Jacko called him "Jock", Jamie retorted that his name was Jamie, not "Jock". (TV: The Underwater Menace)
Jamie tried to understand his new experiences in terms of his life in 1746. When he encountered a Cyberman whilst on his sick bed on the Moonbase, he believed that it was his clan's legend of the Phantom Piper and he was dying. (TV: The Moonbase)
Separated from the Doctor in 71 BC, Jamie, Polly and Ben found themselves in the company of Spartacus in Bruttium. Jamie, having early on blocked Polly's view of corpses in a torched villa, reacted with weariness to the cause to free slaves from the Roman Empire (a cause which similarly ended in defeat with the rebels being crucified by Pompey). Surprisingly, he simply wanted to get back to the TARDIS. However, he helped against Crassus and protected his fellow companions. (PROSE: The Slave War)
He encountered a train when the TARDIS was hit by on in 1920s. He was intrigued by the train. When he started to see the soldiers that Ben saw, though they appeared to him as higland soldiers not navy officers. (AUDIO: The Mouthless Dead)
After the TARDIS faltered in the vortex they landed in New Houston. Staying with Ben at Meg Carvossa house he was kidnapped by a Yes Man. He was taken to an underground city of Yes Man. Jamie was then made to wait on the Yes Men in the city. The Yes Men could see that he was different to the other humans so but him in a machine to analyse his brain. This machine made him see Scotland again. (AUDIO: The Yes Men)
He found the workings of the Galacti-Bank interesting before the Selachians arrived. He tried to stop a Seleachian by covering it in glue, he later saved the Doctor and the other bankers by smothering a bomb in glue. (AUDIO: The Selachian Gambit) At the casino he visited and chased a women when an alarm went off to detect time travellers and she vanished. He was chased by the Sidewinder Syndicate for apparently creating mayhem. (AUDIO: House of Cards)
Polly, Ben, Jamie and the Doctor landed in Kenga, Singapore during World War II. When Clive Freeman bought them to the local hotel, he went searching for the kitchen where he found a vision of the Grim Reaper. He later found Andrews dead. With Lawson's help he devised a warning system to tell if something was about. He started to act nervously and suspiciously during a search through the Jungle for the Forsaken. (AUDIO: The Forsaken)
The natural acceptance and a desire to rationalise things helped Jamie grasp the worlds he saw. Aeroplanes at Gatwick Airport were "flying beasties" to him. He was fascinated by them and by the airport and stole a ticket from Samantha Briggs so he could take a flight. Unfortunately, having never experienced anything like it, he got airsick. A Chameleon, who spoke with an English rather than Scots accent, assumed Jamie's form during this adventure. (TV: The Faceless Ones)
In his investigation of reports of a series of agent provocateurs known as "the Doctor" who had been involved in unusual incidents, the journalist James Stevens interviewed Samantha Briggs about the Gatwick Incident. She told him about the Doctor and Jamie's involvement in the investigation of holiday fraud. (PROSE: Who Killed Kennedy)
Victoria
Shortly after, in an adventure involving the Daleks and their quest for the human Factor, the Doctor's manipulation of those around him caused Jamie to decide to have nothing more to do with him; he thought the Doctor was working with the Daleks to save his own skin. However, it was really manipulation by the Doctor to anger Jamie so that he'd stop at nothing to rescue the young Victoria Waterfield from her captivity by the Daleks. When the humanised Daleks and regular Daleks had destroyed each other, and with her father, a Dalek collaborator, having sacrificed himself to save the Doctor, the Doctor and Jamie "adopted" the orphaned Victoria. (TV: The Evil of the Daleks)
The Doctor, Jamie and Victoria landed on Telos, where a archaeological expedition was breaking into the Cyber-tombs. Jamie and Peter Haydon explored the Weapons Testing Room, where Jamie found a dormat Cybermat, which he thought was a caterpillar. (TV: The Tomb of the Cybermen)
The Doctor, Jamie and Victoria landed on a human spaceship where they aided a Gallifreyan calling himself "Constable Pavo" of Chapter 9 (who was actually the Doctor's old enemy, the Monk), with his investigation of a nearby artificial black hole. (AUDIO: The Black Hole)
According to one account, the Monk then sent the Doctor and Jamie on a diplomatic mission to Space Station Camera. Here, Jamie believed he saw the Doctor killed in a massacre by Sontarans. The Sixth Doctor and Peri Brown appeared, causing the now-feral Jamie, who had taken to living in crawl spaces, to attack Peri. Subsequently, Jamie helped to rescue "his" Doctor, who had not died and had been taken to Seville, Spain in 1985. Jamie spent much of his time evading and being captured by Shockeye, who planned to eat him. (TV: The Two Doctors) According to another account, this mission happened later, when the Doctor was working for the CIA. (PROSE: World Game)
Before returning to Victoria and "Pavo", the Doctor and Jamie then had further adventures, and returned to the ship they departed from before they actually first arrived on the ship, and found the real Pavo, helping her defeat the Monk, for which Pavo agreed not to arrest the Doctor. (AUDIO: The Black Hole)
He was worried that he would meet Yeti when they landed in China. He was also suspicious of a monk that appeared in the village where they were staying. (AUDIO: The Emperor of Eternity)
He said that the liked the smells of the new worlds he visited. He was starting to learn how to read and was confused at the book the Doctor was given by Selsey. Whilst the Doctor helped the scientist he and Victoria were sent on supply duty. When they looked for the Doctor they were attacked by the electronic parchment that was used for books in this time. (AUDIO: The Story of Extinction)
Jamie evidenced strong, unspoken feelings for Victoria, which often showed themselves in his teasing her about her new, more revealing clothes. (TV: The Ice Warriors) While undercover in Salamander's guard, Jamie and Victoria posed as boyfriend and girlfriend. (TV: The Enemy of the World) He showed bursts of bravery and bravado directed at anyone who would harm her. When thinking something had happened to the unconscious Victoria, he worriedly exclaimed that he'd never forgive himself if anything happened to her. He got angry when he thought she had tricked him and had heard his emotional outburst. Jamie was upset when Victoria stated her intention to stay with the Harrises and tried to get her to change her mind and stay with the Doctor and him. Although he never admitted his feelings for her, during their goodbye, he left her with a kiss. When the Doctor and Jamie left in the TARDIS, he watched Victoria waving goodbye on the scanner and said that he couldn't care less about where they went next. (TV: Fury from the Deep)
Travels alone with the Doctor
Info from Twin Piques, The Revolutionaries, Seven to One & One Step Forward, Two Steps Back needs to be added
He was temporarily left in 1967, where he began working at a Scottish radar station. During the Quark invasion, Jamie reunited with the Doctor. Coming up with a plan, the Doctor and Jamie commandeered the flying saucer and opened fire on the Quark invasion force, causing the Quarks to destroy themselves in the confusion. Returning to destroy the Quarks at the castle, Jamie and the Doctor both agreed to accompany each other in the TARDIS again. (COMIC: Invasion of the Quarks)
With Jamie and the Doctor were involved in a battle with the Terrible Zodin that involved multiple incarnations of the Doctor, though he lost his memory of the adventure after Zodin used "mind rubbers" on them. (PROSE: The Colony of Lies, Cold Fusion)
While he repaired the TARDIS' time rotor, the Doctor sent Jamie out to find gold, mercury and Zeiton-7. Jamie helped an old man against some bullies, and in return, the old man gave him a book. When he returned, Jamie discovered that he had been given the Necronomicon by the Master, which transported the Doctor and Jamie to the Great Desolation after the Doctor handled it. There, the duo discovered that the Master had been working with the Archon, who wanted to seize a TARDIS to attack the Time Lords. After they repaired the TARDIS, the Doctor defeated the Archon by playing his recorder whilst Jamie played the bagpipes, which confused and destroyed them. (PROSE: The Nameless City)
Landing on Gano after a war on the planet was lost, the Doctor and Jamie were attacked by giant wasps, but were able to evade them in a trench. Utilising a discarded anti-aircraft gun, they were able to shoot down a wasp, until the swarm changed formation and tackled the gun over, but exposed an underground city to the Doctor and Jamie in the process. Escaping into the city, the duo were confronted by the Quarks, but were able to avoid them using some old scooters, until they came upon a dead end. However, the wasps arrived to attack the Quarks and the battle between them enabled the Doctor and Jamie to make a break for the exit. After a close encounter with a wasp near the exit, which resulted the creature's demise, the Doctor and Jamie made it to the TARDIS and left. (COMIC: The Killer Wasps)
After the TARDIS was forced to materialise by an explosion in 1970 Antarctica, the Doctor and Jamie discovered that aliens were threatening to detonate explosions to throw Earth off its axis. After evading a group of Ice Apes, the Doctor and Jamie followed the aliens' craft down a cave, and, after using dynamite to damage the craft, maneuvered the aliens into a fight with the Ice Apes. After the Ice Apes emerged victorious, the Doctor disarmed the aliens' explosives and, from within the TARDIS, hacked into the world television networks to announce the aliens' defeat to the world. (COMIC: Ice Cap Terror)
Landing on the edge of a jungle, the TARDIS was buried in a rockslide caused by the Quarks, and the Doctor and Jamie were forced to seek shelter from their flying saucer in the jungle. Outrunning the Quarks to a jungle clearing operation, the Doctor and Jamie took control of a bulldozer and an excavator to battle the Quarks directly. Winning the duel with the bulldozer, the Doctor and Jamie made to leave, but were ambushed by the jungle natives enslaved by the Quarks. Forced behind the bulldozer's shovel, the Doctor removed the machine's silencer to frighten the jungle animals into stampeding onto the Quarks. Using the bulldozer to free the TARDIS, which had sustained no damage, the Doctor and Jamie departed the jungle. (COMIC: Jungle of Doom)
When the TARDIS landed in the Time Temple, the Doctor and Jamie were greeted by Father Time, who decided they needed to be punished for their time travel, and rendered them unconscious. Jamie awoke to find himself sealed within a giant hour glass. Noticing a loose bolt, the Doctor freeing Jamie. With Father Time after them, the Doctor took shelter in a cuckoo clock, but Father Time cornered him there. The Doctor was saved by Jamie's intervention, but broke his ankle in the process. Whilst Father Time summoned robots after them, the Doctor was defended by Jamie, who inadvertently damaged the robots enough to set them on Father Time, giving him and the Doctor the chance to escape the Time Temple. (COMIC: Father Time)
After the Doctor completed constructing a mechanical housemaid named Martha, the TARDIS landed in 1971 New York City, where the Doctor and Jamie went to see C. G. Slattery of the Inventions International Company, who was impressed enough with Martha to put the Doctor on nation-wide television to sell hundreds of thousands of Marthas. After a few weeks of successful business, however, the Marthas were taken over by the Quarks to be used as an invasion force. Though the Doctor was able to bring the Marthas back under his control, the Quarks soon arrived to take New York City by force, but the Doctor was able to turn the Marthas savage again to fight back against the Quarks. (COMIC: Martha the Mechanical Housemaid)
Zoe
While on Space Station W3 in the 21st century, which was being attacked by Cybermen and Cybermats, Jamie gave the Doctor his oft-used "John Smith" alias. At the conclusion of this adventure, a young scientist named Zoe Heriot joined the Doctor and Jamie. (TV: The Wheel in Space) Jamie got along with her very well, despite her teasing him for his intelligence, even though Zoe came from a 21st century background very much unlike his own. The Doctor, Jamie and Zoe later landed on Dulkis which was being attacked by the Dominators and the robotic Quarks. Jamie and the Dulcian Cully destroyed several of the Quarks, delaying the Dominators' plan. (TV: The Dominators)
In the Land of Fiction, Jamie temporarily changed into a different youth of the same age when the Doctor failed to put together his facial features correctly in a test. (TV: The Mind Robber)
When Zoe and Isobel Watkins were abducted by Tobias Vaughn, the Doctor and Jamie investigated him and evaded Packer, whom Jamie tackled to the ground. Jamie was pleased to have been given a small radio and didn't want the Doctor to break it when he suspected the gift. The Doctor and Jamie reunited with Lethbridge-Stewart, now a Brigadier. Jamie was later convinced by Zoe and Isobel to go into the sewers to photograph the Cybermen, but were soon cornered by three of them. While escaping the sewers after Captain Turner rescued them, the surviving Cyberman grabbed Jamie's leg, but was destroyed by a grenade. Jamie's leg was later injured by after being shot by one of Vaughn's men After a stay in the hospital, Jamie left with the Doctor and Zoe to stunned surprise at the sight of the appearing and disappearing TARDIS. (TV: The Invasion)
After the Doctor tracked a Cybership to Isos II, he became trapped in the nearby city after the escalators started working and he slid down them. Looking through the city he saw empty cyberpods. Jamie watched one of the Slugs kill a Cyberman before it was killed. He was later rescued by Enab in the bowels of the city. He had to keep defending him wearing a kilt. Eventually, he managed to tell the Doctor what he found. He sense that something was coming towards them on the monorail track. The Cyber-Controller ordered his conversion. As Hislee was the one to put him in the pod he didn't fasten him in which allowed her to escape. (AUDIO: The Isos Network)
Jamie and Zoe had an argument about there being no peaceful aliens in the universe. He decided to exit the TARDIS in a humph because of this to try and prove Zoe wrong. When he entered Aspen Base he initially became calm, but this soon worn off. This was due to the Integral's suppression field. Because his anger was suppressed he started to feel bad because he couldn't use it to help protect Zoe if needed. When Elm was killed he had to fight to protect Zoe but was almost killed but Zoe helped him. After this adventure he had some proof that aliens were good. (AUDIO: The Integral)
He found the city of Sanctuary which was carved out of a mountain. In a cave he met Quadrigger Stoyn who knew of his travels. When a ship crashed near the city he went with the locals to save the crew. (AUDIO: The Dying Light)
After fighting the Krotons, where Jamie nearly died to save the Doctor and Zoe, (TV: The Krotons) he battled the Ice Warriors again, helping prevent them from turning Earth into their new home through spores, saving the Doctor from Slaar while on the Moon. (TV: The Seeds of Death)
When they landed in Tromesis, he immediately sprang to motion to protect the Doctor when he was attacked by a local. He had to explain to the locals of the city about the two version of the city and how to get the the version of the city where they could be saved. (AUDIO: The Apocalypse Mirror)
He later helped defeat Maurice Caven and his argonite pirates after he, the Doctor and Zoe were almost killed when the pirates destroyed Space Beacon Alpha 4, which they had landed on. (TV: The Space Pirates)
At some point during his travels with the Doctor and Zoe, they investigated some mysterious robberies. This was helped by the fact that he was unconscious when the Doctor and Zoe was involved the robberies. (AUDIO: Tales from the Vault) He saved pilot John Finney after his plane was shot down during the Korean War, (PROSE: Prelude First Frontier) and visited Bob Dovie at 59A Barnsfield Crescent in Totton, Hampshire on 23 November 1963. (AUDIO: The Light at the End)
The group landed in the Frenko Bazaar, a famous intergalactic trading post where one could buy "just about anything". The Doctor, in an attempt to take down the slave market, placed a homing device on Jamie, and followed some Voraxx into Stellar Imports & Exports to gain their attention. A member told the Doctor that Jamie, coming from the past, was worth a mint. When he said Jamie wasn't for sale, the Voraxx members followed them, whiserping to themselves.
The Voraxx kidnapped Jamie, and took him aboard a slaver ship in orbit. Following Jamie's signal, the Doctor and Zoe found the trans-mat that led to the ship and found Jamie. They then awoke some Ice Warriors, who started an uprising. The slaves took over the ship, forcing the slavers to leave. As the trio teleported back to the shop, the Doctor was shocked to find his companions missing, having been captured by an entity. (COMIC: Bazaar Adventures)
He didn't like to try and understand the the "gizmos" of the TARDIS. He thought on learning that the Edge was a scientific research facility and thought he would end up being there for weeks. He didn't want to join the Doctor and Zoe in the labs so waited for them to come back. After Provost Curtis wanted the Doctor and Zoe to join him permanently, Jamie was to be killed. He decided to destroy the circuits in the mine to stop Curtis from kidnapping his friend, eventually destroying its Relative Dimensional Stabiliser. (AUDIO: The Edge)
A reluctant farewell
The Doctor and his companions landed on a planet where the War Lords planned to use human soldiers as an army to conquer the galaxy by picking them out of various periods of Earth's history with the War Chief's space-time vessel technology that had been given to them. The Doctor, Jamie and Zoe helped unite the various resistance movements on the planet to fight the War Lords.
When the Doctor asked the Time Lords to intercede to return the victims of the War Lords, Jamie desperately urged the Doctor to escape his sentencing in the TARDIS, but submitted when they could not, promising to never forget the Doctor. After the dematerialisation of the War Lord for his crimes, a tribunal of Time Lords told the Doctor that they would return Zoe and Jamie to their homes. They would also alter Zoe and Jamie's memories, allowing them to only remember their first adventures with the Doctor, but not their travels with the Doctor in the TARDIS. The Doctor watched Jamie, now back in 1746 at the Battle of Culloden, come to the momentarily confused realisation of where he was. Jamie was fired at by a Redcoat, whom he then ran after with a sword, proudly yelling, "Creag an tuire!" for the Clan McCrimmon. (TV: The War Games)
Further travels
The Doctor undertook a mission for the Time Lords and blackmailed them into having Jamie by his side. The Time Lords consented, altering Jamie's memories to make him believe that he was still travelling with the Doctor and Victoria, who had in fact left the TARDIS to live out the rest of her life on Earth. (PROSE: World Game)
According to one account, it was at this point that Jamie accompanied the Doctor on a diplomatic mission to Space Station Camera. Here, Jamie believed he saw the Doctor killed in a massacre by Sontarans. The Sixth Doctor and Peri Brown appeared, causing the now-feral Jamie, who had taken to living in crawl spaces, to attack Peri. Subsequently, Jamie helped to rescue "his" Doctor, who had not died and had been taken to Seville, Spain in 1985. When this adventure had concluded, Jamie left with the Doctor in the TARDIS, intending to someday rejoin Victoria, who he had been told was studying graphology. (TV: The Two Doctors, PROSE: World Game) According to another account, this happened earlier in the Doctor and Jamie's timeline, and they were sent there by the Monk, pretending to be Pavo. (AUDIO: The Black Hole)
They travelled to Helicon Prime to relax whilst on their missions for the CIA. Whilst there was a set of murders. He started to think that the murderer was the ambassador of the planet but was in fact the singer Mindy Voir. (AUDIO: Helicon Prime) Another mission was to travel to Earth in 54,010 to rescue a tribe of Stone Age humans from a bio-dome. (PROSE: All of Beyond)
He was later deposited back in the Scottish Highlands, his memories altered once more by the Time Lords.
Life after the Doctor
Jamie went on to marry Kirsty McLaren and they had "more bairns than there are days in the week", with numerous grandchildren by 1788. In order to correct a mistake that was made in 1688, where Jamie tried to help King James II and ensure a victorious future for Scotland and Bonnie Prince Charlie, a visitor from the CIA came to help alter history back to its original course. However, Jamie chose to once again forget the memories of his adventures with the Doctor that were brought back, as he and Kirsty had a good life together. (AUDIO: The Glorious Revolution)
One of their distant descendants was a 21st century history student at the University of Edinburgh named Heather McCrimmon, who became a companion of the Tenth Doctor. (COMIC: The Chromosome Connection)
While out on the moors, Jamie appeared to have been struck by lightning on a bright, clear day. The men who found him noted that the heather around him had been dotted with flame and that his head had been smoking. Nurse Muir watched over him, with him only remembering her bandaging his head when he was first brought in seemingly days earlier. He began to remember travelling in the TARDIS with the Doctor, including the incident on Helicon Prime, and told the nurse of his adventure. The nurse was revealed to be Mindy Voir, who wanted the Fennus treasure from him, as he had the knotted pendant that was stolen by the Doctor. She began to sing with her deadly voice. As he began to unwind the knot, voices whispered to him from within it. Mindy became trapped inside the pendant when he finally undid the knot. When Jamie awoke, he knew his identity, but did not know how he came to be under the bed in the wrecked, burnt room. (AUDIO: Helicon Prime)
The death of Jamie
When the Sixth Doctor next met him, he had miscalculated and arrived forty years later than he had intended to. Jamie lived as an elderly pariah in his village and lamented that the Doctor shouldn't have had to see him as an old man. Jamie had managed to retain memories of his travels using tricks the Doctor had taught him and because the Time Lords had a less-than-perfect understanding of the human mind.
After he told others about them, the locals believed his wartime experiences had driven him slightly mad. Jamie vindicated himself by vanishing in the TARDIS before the whole village and then helped the Doctor, Peri and Frobisher fight the Cybermen on Marinus. He saved the universe using his sword to destroy the Worldshaper device; this let out a blast that aged him to death. (COMIC: The World Shapers)
Undated events
- At some point, Jamie was taken to the Black Archive by UNIT to have his record as a companion of the Doctor taken. His memories of the visit were subsequently erased and he was sent on his way. (TV: The Day of the Doctor)
Characteristics
Appearance
More often than not, Jamie wore a traditional Scottish kilt with a red tartan. He was often teased for continuing to wear his kilt, even in situations where it was too cold to wear it. (TV: The Abominable Snowmen)
After initially changing out of his battle-ragged 18th century clothes into a wet suit during the course of an adventure, (TV: The Underwater Menace) he began to include more modern clothes in his dress — including several turtlenecks of varying colours, a tan leather vest with a reversible cow-patterned fur lining, a Nehru jacket, a sleeveless pullover, neckerchiefs, anoraks and a laced black shirt. While he usually wore his fur-covered sporran, there was a stretch of time early on during which he didn't. (TV: The Highlanders through the start of The Web of Fear) He would, when necessary, wear a space suit (TV: The Moonbase, The Wheel in Space, The Seeds of Death) or sometimes a disguise. (TV: The Enemy of the World)
The kilt was sometimes jokingly referred to as a "dress" or "skirt", to which he would take mild offence. (TV: The Tomb of the Cybermen, The Enemy of the World, The Two Doctors) When deciding who would have the task of dressing in drag as a disguise in a society where women were in power, the Doctor mentioned his youthful, androgynous appearance in contrast to the rest of the male prisoners, despite his masculine gait, and his comfortability with wearing a "skirt" as reasons that he should be the one to go undercover to retrieve their confiscated clothing. (AUDIO: Prison in Space) He and the Doctor also dressed as washerwomen with wool padding while smuggling King James II into a rowboat. After correcting the Doctor on calling his kilt a "skirt", Jamie mentioned that he thought they looked like "a pair of old fishwives". (AUDIO: The Glorious Revolution) One of the flustered, half-hearted insults levelled at him by the Doctor was being referred to as a "hairy-legged Highlander".
Later, he reverted to his 18th century dress, including a white ruffled shirt, a black jacket and a red tartan sash. When Jamie cleaned himself up after living rough in the ducts of Space Station Camera, the Sixth Doctor unkindly suggested to Jamie that he perhaps could use a bath more often in general. (TV: The Two Doctors) Much later, back in his old time, he grew a long beard and carried a claymore. (COMIC: The World Shapers)
Personality
Jamie had a very strong connection to his Scottish homeland. When presented with the sound of bagpipes and the misty sight of Scotland on the scanner, he was lured out of the TARDIS, as this was what he wanted most. (TV: The Mind Robber) Despite having viewed the English for a long time as his mortal enemy, he teamed up later in his travels with a Redcoat from the Forty-Five, who had also been displaced in time and space, in order to rebel against the War Lords. (TV: The War Games)
The Doctor and Zoe both often teased or insulted Jamie about his intelligence. Zoe expressed relief that Jamie hadn't thought of x-rays before her, which would have been "awful", (TV: The Wheel in Space) and the Doctor even suggested that they run away because of Jamie having an idea. (TV: The Abominable Snowmen) Jamie was simple and straightforward, but he was also practical and full of common sense, despite having no formal education. It was these qualities which often put him ahead of his companions. He came a long way from questioning why the Doctor hadn't bled the wounded and having never heard of "germs" before (he assumed the word came from "German"). (TV: The Highlanders) When Jamie and Victoria were undercover at the Virtor-run New York Supplementary Education Institute in 1982, Jamie needed Victoria to fill out his sign-up forms, as he did not know how to write. Victoria made him promise to practice writing once they got back to the TARDIS. (PROSE: The Lost) Later, he read stiltedly on several occasions. (TV: The Mind Robber, The Invasion) Rago assessed Jamie and discovered that his brain showed signs of recent rapid learning. It was his idea to dig through to a borehole and intercept the seed device which saved the travellers. Later, while the Doctor and Zoe were revelling in their rescue of Dulkis with only a minor volcanic eruption, it was Jamie who pointed out that they happened to be standing on the island that would erupt. (TV: The Dominators) While trapped without the Doctor or Zoe, Jamie had to order a complicated series of events. He was able to defeat Moran by thinking outside of the box, rather than solving the puzzle. (AUDIO: The Jigsaw War)
Although he didn't understand the TARDIS, he was enthusiastic about it. His journey was a voyage of discovery; almost everything he experienced was new to him. The few times when Jamie showed worry or concern were when his companions were in danger — particularly Victoria. When the unconscious Doctor was threatened by an Ice Warrior, Jamie attempted hand-to-hand combat with it, despite being unevenly matched and at great risk to himself, to protect him. (TV: The Seeds of Death) Jamie saw the Doctor as a friend and mentor. He was extremely loyal to the Doctor and they were nearly inseparable. He learnt a lot through his experiences, but also believed the Doctor needed his help. When Ben and Polly left the TARDIS, Jamie reassured them that he would look after the Doctor. (TV: The Faceless Ones)
Jamie was initially very shy around girls and awkward in situations where they were forward. In one case, he wanted the ladies who were primping him called off because he was afraid of what they might do to him if he looked "charming". (TV: The Macra Terror) He kissed Sam in order to steal her plane ticket. (TV: The Faceless Ones) When he was being flirted with by girls in a 1960s coffee bar wearing plaid miniskirts — to which he exclaimed, "Oh, if only the Laird could see that!" — he hurried back to the Doctor. He was not comfortable with having been given the difficult task of questioning them, despite the Doctor stating that Jamie was so much better at it than he. (TV: The Evil of the Daleks)
Jamie seemed intrigued with the short dresses that he had seen the ladies wearing. He teased Victoria about whether she saw herself wearing something similar, a thought for which she admonished him. (TV: The Ice Warriors) Despite his early shyness, Jamie began to flirt more, but was always gentlemanly and chivalrous. Jamie apologised when he realised that it was Rapunzel's hair that he had climbed and assured her that he was quickly passing through when she expressed wariness at inviting him inside her castle. (TV: The Mind Robber) Jamie expressed old-fashioned values about the roles of men and women, often seeing it as his duty to protect the ladies, even when they rebuked him with modern concepts of feminism and women's suffrage. (TV: The Invasion, The War Games) When Zoe misidentified his Scottish origin, calling his kilt a barbaric form of garment and asking whether he was a Scandinavian or a Dane, he told her to watch her lip or else he'd put her across his knee and larrup her. (TV: The Wheel in Space) He later gave Zoe a spanking over his knee when she had been taken over by female superiority brainwashing. (AUDIO: Prison in Space) After having been ignored by Anita earlier, he gave Peri a peck when he was about to leave with his Doctor. (TV: The Two Doctors) He had previously shared two kisses with Sam (TV: The Faceless Ones) and one with Victoria. (TV: Fury from the Deep) He later shared one with Peri Brown. (TV: The Two Doctors)
The Second Doctor considered Jamie to be the most reliable friend that he had ever had. (AUDIO: The Jigsaw War)
During their travels together, Ben and Polly thought of Jamie as being like their "baby brother." (AUDIO: The Forbidden Time)
Jamie considered Zoe to be "a nice enough lassie" but was irritated by her occasional smugness. (AUDIO: The Edge)
On 31 December 1986, twenty years after they left the TARDIS, Ben described Jamie as "a good bloke" to Polly. (PROSE: Mondas Passing)
In the 2000s, Polly described Jamie as being "brawny and reckless but lovely" and "a bit slow on the uptake" to Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. (AUDIO: The Three Companions)
The Sixth Doctor told Peri that he was "always very fond of Jamie." (TV: The Two Doctors)
Habits and quirks
Jamie had a habit of pretending to understand technology beyond his ken with a shrug and a nonchalant, "Oh, aye." He often used analogies to describe the new things he was seeing — he compared Space Station Camera to "twenty castles in the sky" and called the Sontarans "knights in armour" or "potato heads" and aeroplanes "flying beasties." (TV: The Two Doctors, The Faceless Ones) He referred to the Cybermen and the Daleks as "metal beasties." (AUDIO: House of Cards, The Rosemariners) If he couldn't understand or compare something, he would simply ignore it.
He had a particular fascination with gadgets such as Polly's secretarial dictaphone, which she kept his recordings on for many years after (AUDIO: The Forbidden Time) and the small radio that he was given by Tobias Vaughn. (TV: The Invasion) Although he didn't know how they worked, he was able to figure out how to get these simple devices to function.
Jamie carried a sgian dubh, though he rarely ever used it, and only then in self-defence, as when he stabbed a Sontaran in the leg. (TV: The Mind Robber, The Two Doctors) He also wielded a sword or claymore on occasion, particularly while in his own time. (TV: The Abominable Snowmen, The War Games, COMIC: The World Shapers) On several occasions, he used or expressed interest in weapons such as explosives, grenades, rock-throwing, and guns, both historical and futuristic. (TV: The Dominators, The War Games) Good in a fight, he was also known to tackle enemies to the ground (TV: The Invasion) and get into physical altercations. (TV: The Underwater Menace, The Krotons, The Seeds of Death, The War Games) He often took it upon himself to go after beasties. (TV: The Macra Terror, The Dominators)
He enjoyed a high degree of familiar physical contact, such as friendly shoving, prodding, pulling, hand-holding, climbing on top of or being climbed upon, and hugging. When stressed for any reason he would often grab on to his companions for reassurance, with a marked preference for grabbing the Doctor.
Skills and abilities
Jamie had the ability to sense and reject subconscious mental manipulation while asleep, (TV: The Macra Terror) as well as sense danger. (TV: Fury from the Deep) He was also the first to be affected and detect that something was wrong after they had exited the TARDIS upon first arriving in the Land of Fiction. (TV: The Mind Robber)
The young piper had musical ability, though he rarely displayed it. When his family legacy of piping was mentioned, he noted that all he had left of his bagpipes was the chanter. The Doctor wanted him to teach him how to play the bagpipes in return for being invited aboard the TARDIS. (TV: The Highlanders) He later found some bagpipes in the TARDIS, which he planned to mend. (TV: The Abominable Snowmen) At one point, he danced the Highland Fling in an attempt to dance out of the room and escape. (TV: The Macra Terror) The Doctor remarked that Jamie often attempted to hide his recorder from him. (COMIC: The Forgotten)
He also was able to ride horses and used this skill to escape a Confederate soldier after knocking him off of his horse. (TV: The War Games) He was also adept at rock climbing. He scaled steep rocks with the aid of Rapunzel's rope of hair. (TV: The Mind Robber) However, he wasn't particularly good at tying knots and the Doctor wanted to be reminded to give him a lesson sometime. (TV: The Tomb of the Cybermen)
Jamie expressed worry about being drowned and said that he couldn't swim when Ben suggested that they escape by swimming. (TV: The Highlanders) The Doctor also mentioned that a member of their group might not know how to swim. At the time, Jamie and Polly were fleeing the rising water which was quickly engulfing the underwater city of Atlantis. (TV: The Underwater Menace) The Doctor and Jamie occasionally paddled a kayak (TV: The Invasion) or a rowboat together on the River Thames in November 1688. (AUDIO: The Glorious Revolution)
The Doctor taught Jamie how to read in his spare time. (AUDIO: The Jigsaw War) Victoria also gave him reading lessons on occasion and once tried to get him to read Robinson Crusoe. (PROSE: The Dark Path; AUDIO: The Story of Extinction)
Known family
This section needs to be rewritten as SOURCED prose.
- Donald McCrimmon (ancestor, 13th century)
- Ewan McCrimmon (ancestor, 13th century)
- Paternal grandfather (piper)
- Donald McCrimmon (father, piper)
- Duncan (uncle)
- Brothers
- Old Granny McLaren (grandmother-in-law)
- Colin McLaren (father-in-law, Laird)
- Alexander McLaren (brother-in-law)
- Kirsty McLaren (wife)
- At least eight children and numerous grandchildren by 1788
- A female descendant c. 1815 who carried Jamie's Vortex radiation, which trapped the Mozhtratta in the family chromosomes (COMIC: The Chromosome Connection, Dead-line)
- Heather McCrimmon (descendant)
References
Illusions of Jamie and Zoe appeared to the Second Doctor and Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart in the Death Zone on Gallifrey. (TV: The Five Doctors)
A fictional version of Jamie was created in the Land of Fiction by Zoe after she faced the Cybermen. (AUDIO: Legend of the Cybermen)
After Jamie's death, a shapeshifting Gwanzulum took the form of the youthful Jamie to trick the Seventh Doctor. (COMIC: Planet of the Dead)
Experiencing trauma from his recent regeneration, the Fifth Doctor imagined that he was with Jamie. (TV: Castrovalva)
When under the influence of a Dalek mind-draining device, the Fifth Doctor recalled Jamie among other companions. (TV: Resurrection of the Daleks)
Before she had ever met him, Peri Brown mentioned that the Sixth Doctor had absentmindedly called her "Jamie." (TV: Attack of the Cybermen)
The Sixth Doctor later fondly recalled Jamie when he met a man of the same name in Edinburgh, 1828, telling him that Jamie was an honourable name. (AUDIO: Medicinal Purposes)
Izzy Sinclair tried on one of Jamie's sweaters and kilts, which she had found in the TARDIS wardrobe. (COMIC: Ophidius)
When introducing himself to Queen Victoria in 1879, the Tenth Doctor used the alias Doctor James McCrimmon. (TV: Tooth and Claw)
A version of Jamie appeared in a "hellscape" dream the Eleventh Doctor created while the mind parasite Mr Waites fed off the worst thing Doctor could imagine. In the dream, the Doctor worked in the Mediation Sector of the Department of Commonality. He turned away Jamie when he was to be sent to a work camp. The Doctor said it was above his authority. (COMIC: John Smith and the Common Men)
Behind the scenes
- McCrimmon is the anglicised form of the Gaelic Mac Ruimein "son of Ruimen", which is the Gaelic form of the Old Norse personal name Hroðmundr, composed of hród "fame" + mundr "protection". This was the name of a famous family of pipers for the Clan MacLeod.
- Patrick Troughton and Frazer Hines met in 1964 on the set of Smuggler's Bay (also wiped by the BBC), during which Patrick recalled Frazer injuring his hand through a pane of glass and mentioned it to him when they reunited on The Highlanders. Patrick and Frazer were friends in real life and were known for indulging in innuendo and playing practical jokes, usually on their female co-stars, on set and during rehearsals.
- Jamie was never intended to become a companion, but the production liked the actor and rewrote the ending of The Highlanders to bring Jamie aboard the TARDIS (he originally departed aboard the Annabelle). Jamie's original Highlander accent was deemed unsuitable (a bit monotone) for a continuing companion and was changed to a "television Scots" accent, although Frazer could do both.
- Frazer said he played the part as if he had fallen in love with Victoria, though no admittance of this was ever spoken on-screen.
- During the making of The Mind Robber, Frazer caught chicken pox from his nephew. Hamish Wilson, who looked very unlike him, filled in for him. The justification for this formed part of the plot of the story. A persistent myth (debunked by the episode notes) describes the latter actor as Frazer's cousin. However, Frazer's brother, Ian Hines, has a small role in the story as one of the Clockwork Soldiers.
- Jamie was to depart in a Season 6 story called The Laird of McCrimmon, which would have been set in 18th century Scotland and seen the return of the Great Intelligence and the Yeti. However, this was never made due to a dispute between the BBC and Mervyn Haisman and Henry Lincoln, the creators of the Intelligence and the Yeti, over the rights to the Quarks. Frazer's agent wanted him to leave the show, but Patrick persuaded Frazer, who was reluctant to leave, that they would depart together.
- Jamie was the first (and for many years, only) television companion to appear in the comic strips.
- Jamie was the first established TV companion to be killed off in licensed spin-off media.
- Jamie would have had a cameo in The Three Doctors, except that Frazer had a prior work commitment on Emmerdale Farm. The show also prevented Frazer from having more than two days off to film his cameo in The Five Doctors. Had he been available, Jamie would have been the Second Doctor's designated companion instead of the Brigadier. It was seeing Patrick and Frazer reunite that inspired John Nathan-Turner to bring them back for The Two Doctors.
- American author Diana Gabaldon was inspired to create the Outlander series after watching an episode of Doctor Who on PBS. The episode in question was from The War Games. Gabaldon set her story in Scotland and included a highlander named Jamie Fraser as a main character. Despite rumours, the surname Fraser was not suggested by the name of the actor playing Jamie, Frazer Hines. It is a coincidence.
- Jamie was dubbed in German by voice actors Gerhard Acktun in The Five Doctors and Erhard Hartmann in The Two Doctors.
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