Corporal Askwith was a Starfleet non-commissioned officer assigned as a security officer to the United Earth Embassy on Vulcan in 2154. In that year, Askwith was seriously injured in an explosion at the embassy, the result of a bomb placed by conspirators attempting to frame the Syrranite dissident movement. Askwith subsequently fell into a coma as a result of his injuries, and was put under the care of Doctor Phlox, chief medical officer of Enterprise NX-01.