Lethbridge-Stewart family
The Lethbridge-Stewart family was a storied one. Notable members included Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart.
History
Origins
Originally the Lethbridges were from Devon, and went on to be the Lethbridge Baronets of Devonshire, while in Lanark, Scotland, the Stewarts were part of the Clan Stewart (PROSE: The Forgotten Son) and related to the Stuart kings of Scotland. The Lethbridge-Stewart began with the wedding of William Stewart and Mary Lethbridge in 1603. (PROSE: The Daughters of Earth)
Ancestors of the Brigadier
Alistair came from a military tradition. (COMIC: The Warkeeper's Crown )
When James VI arrived to claim the English throne as James I in 1603, the Brigadier's ancestor, William Lethbridge-Stewart, accompanied him. (TV: Terror of the Zygons, PROSE: The Dying Days)
Major General Fergus Lethbridge-Stewart was the Duke of Wellington's right-hand man at the Battle of Waterloo. (PROSE: The Scales of Injustice)
The Brigadier's paternal grandfather Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart worked for British Intelligence in Russia during World War I. He returned to the United Kingdom in the aftermath of the Russian Revolution of 1917. (PROSE: The Wages of Sin)
His brother was named Archibald Hamish Lethbridge-Stewart. (TV: Twice Upon a Time, PROSE: Night of the Intelligence) He was a veteran of World War I who served at Ypres in December 1914. Archibald was kidnapped by the Testimony moments before his death to record his memories and met the First Doctor and Twelfth Doctor due to a timeline error and shared an adventure with them. Before his memory was erased, he asked the Doctors to look in on his family which they promised to do. Unknown to all but the First Doctor, the Twelfth Doctor altered time slightly in order to save Archibald and his German opponent by moving them forward in time a couple of hours to the beginning of the Christmas Armistice. (TV: Twice Upon a Time)
The Bigadier also had a "great uncle" Mario, really a second cousin of the Brig's Granny McDougal. (AUDIO: The Ghosts of N-Space)
The Brigadier's father, Gordon Conall Lethbridge-Stewart, ended his life as a wing commander in the Royal Air Force in World War II, and was listed as missing in action in 1945. (PROSE: The Forgotten Son)
Gordon James Lethbridge-Stewart was born in 1925, but died in 1938 after being haunted by the Great Intelligence. He carried the immortal soul that would one day reincarnate and ascend to become the Great Intelligence in the distant future. Gordon James was reincarnated as Owain Vine, who later became close to the Brigadier and they considered themselves uncle/nephew. (The Lethbridge-Stewart series.)
In 1970, the Brigadier finally embraced a second nephew, Dylan Lethbridge-Stewart, the son of an alternative-reality version of Gordon James Lethbridge-Stewart, who was brought to the Brigadier's Earth in 1959, when he was only ten. (PROSE: Times Squared, Night of the Intelligence)
Descendants of the Brigadier
The Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart had many descendants who played significant roles in the history of Earth.
Mariama and his descendants
As a young officer stationed in Sierra Leone, Lethbridge-Stewart fathered a son with Mariatu, daughter of Chief Yembe of the Royoke village. This son, Mariama, was the father of Kadiatu. Kadiatu authored The Zen Military, an exposé of the activities of UNIT published in 2006.
Kadiatu's great-grandson, Yembe Lethbridge-Stewart, led the UN forces during the Thousand Day War between humans and Ice Warriors in the late 21st century and was the adoptive father of Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart, whose time travel activities at first proved quite troublesome for the Seventh Doctor. (PROSE: Transit)
Kate Lethbridge-Stewart and her descendants
With his first wife, Fiona, the Brigadier fathered a daughter named Kate. Kate was estranged from her father for six years and it was not until the events surrounding the Great Intelligence's third attempt to conquer Earth in the 1990s that Lethbridge-Stewart learned Kate had given him a grandson, Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart. (PROSE: Downtime) Jonathan was the father of Gordon. But when Gordon was two years old Jonathan left the family. Neither Gordon nor Kate saw him again. (HOMEVID: Downtime) Kate later bore a second child. (TV: Death in Heaven) Around the 2010s, Kate was one of the leaders of at least the British division of UNIT. (TV: The Power of Three)
Albert Wilson and his descendants
While on a weekend with Alistair in 1968, Doris Bryden (latterly Wilson, and then Lethbridge-Stewart) became pregnant. Nine months later Albert was born, by which point Doris had married Harold Wilson. Despite knowing Albert wasn't his, Harold raised Albert as his own. It was only many years after his death that Albert tracked down his real father, on 1 January 1990. By this point Albert was married to Tamara (Ware), and they were expecting their first child. (PROSE: The Enfolded Time) Conall was the first born, and was latterly followed by Nicholas (Nick) and Lucy. Conall grew up hearing stories of his grandfather's exploits and the two were particularly close. Lucy was also enamoured by the stories of the Lethbridge-Stewart lineage, and was jealous when Conall changed his surname to Lethbridge-Stewart in December 2011. This influence on his children drove a wedge between Albert and Alistair. (PROSE: The Two Brigadiers, Lucy Wilson) In late 2017, when Albert, Tamara and Lucy moved to Ogmore-by-Sea (by this point Conall was a married man to Dean Howard, with an adopted daughter, Hannah, and Nick was studying in university), Lucy was pulled into an adventure to defeat the Great Intelligence. She met Dame Anne Bishop, and received a time ring from her. (PROSE: Avatars of the Intelligence)
Family Names
The Lethbridge-Stewart family tends to follow the British tradition of passing down given names. Popular male names in the family include:
- Conall (Used four times since the mid-1800s, twice as a first name, and twice as a middle name).
- Hamish (Used three times since the late-1800s, once as a forename, and twice as a middle name).
- Gordon (Used four times since the 1920s, thrice as a forename, and once as a middle name).
- James (First used by the Gore side of the family, it has been used twice since as a middle name).
Behind the scenes
In the unproduced Doctor Who 30th anniversary special The Dark Dimension Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart also had a son, Alexander Stewart, who died in 1979 at the age of ten.
