Samwise Gamgee

Lineage

Samwise was born on 6 April T.A. 2980 (S.R. 1380), the fifth of the six children of Hamfast Gamgee, the Gaffer, and Bell Goodchild. The Gamgees were plain working Hobbits of Hobbiton with no pretensions to Took or Brandybuck blood, and Sam grew up at Number 3 Bagshot Row, in the row of holes just below Bag End, where his father was gardener to Bilbo Baggins. His name meant something like 'half-wise' in the old tongue of the Shire, and it embarrassed him. From his father he learned gardening and a fund of sturdy sayings; from Bilbo, against the Gaffer's better judgement, he learned his letters, a great deal of poetry, and a hopeless longing to see Elves.

Chosen companion

Sam succeeded his father as gardener at Bag End, working for Frodo after Bilbo left. In April 3018, while Gandalf told Frodo the truth about the Ring, Sam was clipping the grass under the study window and hearing every word. Dragged in by the ear, he was sentenced by the wizard to go with Frodo, and he wept for joy. He was thirty-eight, had never been further than the Woody End, and was the least likely of adventurers; his baggage included cooking gear, salt, rope, and a firm conviction that his master was the finest person in the world and needed looking after.

He was the first of the party to meet Elves, in Gildor's company, and he was the one who told Frodo that he had understood what the journey would cost and meant to see it through. Along the road he tended Bill the pony, whom he had rescued from Bill Ferny at Bree, and he grieved bitterly at losing him outside the gates of Moria. In Lothlórien Galadriel gave him a small box of earth from her orchard with a single silver nut in it, a gift that at the time seemed the least of all the Fellowship's presents.

Into Mordor

When the Fellowship broke at Amon Hen on 26 February 3019 Sam alone worked out what Frodo would do, ran for the boats, nearly drowned, and was hauled out by his master. From then on the two hobbits and, presently, Gollum went east alone. Sam distrusted Gollum from the first, watched him through every night, and never quite forgave him for existing; it was his coarse words on the stair of Cirith Ungol, spoken when Gollum had come nearer to repentance than at any time in five centuries, that ended the creature's last chance. In Ithilien he cooked stewed rabbit, saw an oliphaunt, and blurted out the secret of the Ring to Faramir, who proved worthy of it.

At the pass Gollum betrayed them to Shelob. Sam found Frodo bound in her webs, fought the spider with Sting and drove her off with the light of the Phial, wounding her as she tried to crush him. Believing Frodo dead, he made the hardest decision of his life: to take the Ring and go on with the quest himself. When the Orcs came and he learned from their talk that Frodo lived, he turned back at once. Wearing the Ring, and with its temptation whispering visions of Samwise the Strong and gardens the size of kingdoms, he climbed alone into the Tower of Cirith Ungol, where the garrison had conveniently slaughtered itself, found Frodo with a song, and gave the Ring back without argument. He is the only bearer besides Bilbo of whom that can be said.

Across Gorgoroth Sam gave Frodo his water and his food, shed his own gear to lighten the load, and on the slopes of Mount Doom carried his master on his back. When Gollum attacked them there for the last time Sam had him at the point of Sting and, understanding at last something of what the Ring had done to him, let him go. Inside the mountain he saw Frodo claim the Ring, saw Gollum take it and fall, and dragged Frodo out onto the slope to wait for the end. The Eagles found them there.

The Scouring and the restoring

Honoured on the Field of Cormallen and in Minas Tirith, Sam went home to find the Shire trampled, the trees felled and his father turned out of Bagshot Row. He fought at the Battle of Bywater with Merry and Pippin and then set about the work that mattered most to him. Through the winter he travelled the Shire replanting, and remembered Galadriel's box: he placed a grain of her earth at the root of every sapling and the rest, with the silver nut, in the Party Field where the old Party Tree had stood. The result was a mallorn, the only one west of the mountains, and the year 1420 became the most bountiful in the Shire's memory.

Master of Bag End

On 1 May 3020 Sam married Rose Cotton, and Frodo invited them both to live at Bag End. Their first child, Elanor, was born on 25 March 3021, and twelve more followed: Frodo, Rose, Merry, Pippin, Goldilocks, Hamfast, Daisy, Primrose, Bilbo, Ruby, Robin and Tolman. Frodo, meanwhile, was failing. In September 3021 Sam rode with him to the Grey Havens, not understanding until the last mile that his master meant to sail, and came back along the road to Bywater to a lit fire and a supper, with the Red Book in his keeping and the whole of Bag End his own.

The rest of his life fulfilled the promise Frodo had made him. He was elected Mayor of Michel Delving in S.R. 1427 and re-elected six times, serving until 1476. In 1434 the King made him a Counsellor of the North-kingdom, and in 1436 Aragorn came north to the Brandywine Bridge and gave him the Star of the Dúnedain; Elanor became a maid of honour to Queen Arwen. The family took the surname Gardner in later years. His daughter Goldilocks married Pippin's son Faramir, joining the Gamgees to the Thain's house.

The last Ring-bearer

Rose died on Mid-year's Day 1482. On 22 September of that year Sam rode to the Undertowers, gave the Red Book to Elanor, and went on to the Havens. The tradition of the Fairbairns held that, as the last of the Ring-bearers, he passed over the Sea to Frodo. He was a hundred and two years old.

After Rose's death he gave the Red Book to Elanor and, on 22 September S.R. 1482, went to the Grey Havens and, as the last Ring-bearer, passed over the Sea.