Johann Shmidt (Earth-616)/Expanded History

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Preface

The history of the Red Skull spans of 70 years of publications. Below is an abridged version of his history. For an unabridged version see

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Order of Appearance: Wherever possible, all orders of Red Skull's appearances over his 70 year history has been cross referenced with the Avengers, Thor & Captain America: Official Index to the Marvel Universe Vol 1.

Regarding 1940s Publications: It has been revealed that a number of Red Skull's wartime adventures were actual comic book adaptations published as wartime propaganda, particularly this adventures with the Young Allies but they are based on actual facts despite obvious embellishments and artistic license on the part of the comic book creators.

Early Life

False Account

The Red Skull, born Johann Shmidt once claimed that he was born in 1899 in an undisclosed Germany town to alcoholic Hermann and the reportedly saintly Martha Shmidt. His mother died giving birth to him, and his father -- driven mad with grief -- blamed the boy for the death of his wife and attempted to kill the child. Young Johann was saved by the doctor who helped birth him and Heramnn committed suicide the following day, making Johann an orphan.

Placed in an orphanage he was treated as an outcast until finally in 1906 at the age of 7 he ran away from the orphanage and lived in the streets as a beggar and a thief. He was good at neither. Seeking refuge in dark places, and spending time in and out of jail, Johann grew to adult hood living on the streets. He had a number of menial jobs until he took a job with a Jewish shop keeper, the first employer who treated him nicely. Falling in love with his daughter Esther, young Johann made a pass to kiss her and she rejected him. Sent into a fury, Johann bludgeoned her to death with a shovel and fled into the night. Years later after the Nazis rise to power, Johann managed to get a job as a bellhop. One day while attending to a room rented by Adolf Hitler, Johann heard as the Fuehrer berated a Gestapo chief for allowing a spy to get away. After berating the chief and telling him that he could teach a bellhop to do a better job than he, Hitler noticed the hatred in the boys eyes and realized that he was going to do just that. When his subordinates could only see to train him like a regular member of the SS, Hitler had higher aspirations for him and trained him to become the Red Skull, an agent second only to Hitler himself.

While the general tale itself is true, there are a number of inaccuracies to the actual account of the Red Skull's ascension from impoverished street urchin to the most feared Nazi agent of all time. At the time of this telling the Red Skull was rapidly aging and on the brink of death. As such it is likely he may have forgotten, or glossed over some of the facts, however some form of deception in telling this tale should not be ruled out either.

True Account

Spoiler Warning

Plot or ending details follow. Please skip this section if you do not want foreknowledge of this plot.

All information under this heading pertains to the events of the Red Skull - Incarnate Limited series. Read at your own risk

Johann Shmidt circa 1923. Red Skull #1

Actually born in 1914, Johann Shmidt, his mother died during child birth. Previous accounts of who his parents are and how he came to be an orphan are not confirmed. He grew up in a Munich at the Munich Home for Warward Boys during the Weimar Republic, during one of the greatest depressions in German history. It was a time of great social strife as the Adolf Hitler's Nazi Party was attempting to rise to power and restore the social republic. By November 1923, at the age of 9, Shmidt was regularly disciplined with brutal punishment by the headmaster of the orphanage for even the smallest infractions, constantly punishing the boy for actions that he viewed as cowardice. His only friend growing up was a boy named Dieter Lehmann, who Johann helped to protect a stray puppy from the dog catcher. Surprisingly, their headmaster allowed the boys to keep the pet. One day Johann rushed outside to witness a march of the Nazi party toward city hall. When the police force responded with violence. As the street erupted in chaos, Shmidt attempted to flee, but his headmaster would not let him, telling the boy to stand and face the chaos like a man.

Johann attends a Nazi march on Munich city hall, circa 1923. Red Skull #1

When Shmidt grabbed for a gun dropped on the ground and attempted to shoot the man, the headmaster knocked the gun out of his hand. Fleeing into the crowd, Shmidt jumped into a dog catchers truck to escape. He convinced the dog catcher to take him home and teach him how to kill dogs like he does. The dog catcher complies and after bludgeoning and then fatally cutting a vicious dog in front of the boy, the dog catcher then offered Johann a docile pup to kill. Unable to bring himself to kill the dog, Johann watched as the dog catcher disgustingly threw it in the pen with the other dogs. Watching as the pup was attacked by the other dogs, Johann attempted to save it and was attacked. With his life threatened, Johann managed to beat all the dogs to death with the stick alone. Going to the wounded dog, Johann was shocked when it bit him before dying. Coming to terms with the brutal world that he was born into, Johann got up and left the dog to die in the pouring rain, a road that would lead to him becoming one of the most notorious murderers in human history.

Living on the streets, young Johann survived by thievery for the next three years. By November 1926 he was living on the streets around Kurfurstendamm the grand boulevard of Berlin. He soon crossed path with another boy named Bormann who was in charge of the other children on the streets who demanded that Johann steal for him. When Johann defended himself with a knife, Bormann and his fellow gang members fought back, forcing Johann to flee into the crowded street. Seeking refuge in a shop owned by a Jewish man and his daughter Emmy. Seeking sanctuary, Johann lied to them, telling them that he was from a Jewish family and was kicked out of his family home following the death of his parents, explaining his bleeding nose was a result of being jumped by Nazis outside. Sympathetic to the boy the shop keeper invited Johann into his home offering him food, a place to stay and a warm bed. That night, Johann was spotted by Bormann who told Johann to keep an eye on the shopkeeper, suggesting that he might have a lot of money and that at the right moment he should size it. As time went on the Jewish family came to care for Johann and he came to regard them well. However, one night as he was watched by Bormann he decided to steal from the family's register and leave. However, Johann changed his mind at the last moment, but was caught by the shop owner. Taking the boy aside and having a drink with the lad, the shop owner told Johann that with times the way they are, it is survival of the fittest and that he should have taken the money. He told the boy that things would change and the world would become a kinder place. About ready to murder the shop keeper, Johann decided to stay his knife and continued to live peacefully with the family for a number of months. That all changed in March of 1927, as tensions between the Communist Red Front and the Nazis erupted in violence while the two groups were having a simultaneous rallies. When the members of the Nazi party decided to look for trouble, the shop keeper was identified as a Jew by Bormann leading him to be be attacked on the street. The shopkeeper told Johann to keep Emmy safe. Johann took Emmy back to the shop and locked the door. When Bormann and his gang came by telling Johann to rob the place while the shopkeeper is away, Emmy believed that Johann would do it and pushed him into the shop window. When he told her that he was there to protect her, Bormann tossed a brick through the window and attempted to enter. Johann then quickly cut his throat, and as Bormann bled to death his gang fled. With Emma in hysterics, Johann tried to talk sense into her but soon lost his temper and punched her across the face. Leaving her alive, Johann then stole the money from the register and left. Seeing the shop keeper beaten on the street calling his name, Johann would look at the man, and then drop the money, walking away and leaving the shop keeper to live or die on the street.

1933

By 1933, as the Nazis continued to rise to power, Johann became a killer for hire, eliminating a member of the Nazi party for a local crime boss named Emil Beckert, to whom the Nazi member attempted blackmail him while an accountant. Paid for the job, Johann was told to take a trip and lay low for a while. On his way out, he ran into his friend Dieter who was a Communist supporter protesting against the Nazis. This led to Dieter being roughed up by some Brownshirts, but Johann came to his aid, getting cut with a knife in the process. Fleeing back to Dieter's home where he was patched up. Dieter confided that Johann's "stance" against their headmaster inspired him to run away from the orphanage after. On February 23rd, Johann accompanied Dieter at a protest outside the Berlin Sportplatz, but when their protest was causing trouble and Johann saw that the resisters decided to still stand even though they were unarmed, he left Dieter and the others. On the February 25th he met again with Herr Beckert, who told Johann that the Nazis are looking for any reason to start a fight and to keep his thumb on Dieter, or kill him. When Johann pointed out that Dieter was his friend, Beckert told Johann that he had no friends. That night, Johann returned to Dieter's home and forced him to accompany him on a job that really would make a "difference" by eliminating the crime boss, by pointing out that he too preyed on the week. When Dieter could not bring himself to kill Beckert, Johann began to beat him, until their attention was turned to Reichstag which had just been set on fire.

That was on the early hours of February 27th, 1933, the night that Dutch leftist Marinus von der Lubbe set the Reichstag on fire, acting alone. In response to the fire Adolf Hitler and Hermann Goering determined it to be part of a Communist uprising. Goering then drafted the Brownshirts into an auxiliary police force. On February 28th President von Hindenburg signed the Reichstag Fire Decree which suspended virtually ever free right the German people had to free speech, freedom to assemble, and all privacy rights. As Berlin was being swept for Communist supporters, Johann and Dieter fled capture. When Dieter blew their cover, he decided to stop running and was beaten by a pair of Brownshirts while Johann fled. Dieter was then placed in Dachau one of Nazi Germany's first concentration camps. Over the next few months the German's completed their rise to power, and among the 1.6 million Germans to join the Nazi party, Johann Shmidt was one of them.

By the spring of that year, Johann was a member of the Brownshirts, but was had aspirations to be a member of the S.S. as they were allowed to carry guns. During a rally for Hitler, he expressed as much when he balked at his desire to sing. This led to disciplinary action from his superior even though he agreed with Johann's sentiment. Later outside, he confronted some S.S. troops and asks what it would take to join their ranks. Although they mocked him for his lack of stature, their commanding officer offered him a chance to prove his mettle by taking his Luger and firing it at a Jewish shop keeper and his son. Johann did as ordered, but the gun was unloaded. The commander thought that Johann had the right attitude, but mocked him for being "stupid". Angered, Johann lashed out, pistol whipping the commander and getting beaten up for his trouble. Three months later, after Dieter and other communists were let free under strict orders to not talk about their experience, Dieter was undaunted and sought to continue his protest against the Nazis. In seclusion he began organizing his followers when they were interrupted by Johann who crashed through the door. Johann then showed Dieter that even as a member of the Brownshirts he was beaten and abused as well and suggests that they should work together to assassinate Hitler himself.

Spoiler Warning

Plot or ending details follow. Please skip this section if you do not want foreknowledge of this plot.

End of Spoiler Warning

World War II

Becoming the Red Skull

Shmidt longed for a master who would show him the way to achieve power. Years later, after the Nazis had come to power in Germany, Shmidt was working in a hotel where the dictator of Germany's Third Reich, Adolf Hitler, came one day to stay. That night Shmidt brought refreshments to Hitler's suite and found Hitler berating the chief of the Gestapo (the secret police of Nazi Germany) for letting a spy escape. On hearing Hitler's voice, Shmidt decided that Hitler was the master he had sought. When Hitler ranted to the Gestapo chief that "I could teach that bellboy to do a better job than you!" the dictator then looked closely at Shmidt and saw the bellboy's hatred, of all mankind, an emotion that Hitler asserted he himself shared. Shmidt saw in Hitler's eyes all of his own fears and frustrations, the embodiment of evil, and a model after which he could pattern himself. Inspired, Hitler declared that he would make the bellboy into a "perfect Nazi" who would serve as his right-hand man. Shmidt eagerly agreed to do what Hitler wished.

Trying to carry out Hitler's orders, his subordinates at first attempted to train Shmidt to become a perfect German soldier wearing an ordinary SS uniform. Enraged, for he wanted to turn Shmidt into something quite different, Hitler personally took over Shmidt's training. Hitler gave Shmidt a lifelike red skull-like head mask and named him the Red Skull. The Skull was answerable only to Hitler himself.

1941

The Skull undertook a wide variety of missions for Hitler, most of which involved the Skull's specialty, the spreading of terror. In the early 1940's, before the United States entered World War II, the Red Skull was particularly involved with subversive activities in the United States. The United States government created the costumed persona of Captain America so that there would be a costumed counterpart to the Red Skull. It was in the United States, before America officially entered World War II, that the Red Skull had his first conflicts with Steve Rogers, the original Captain America, the man who became his principal and perennial nemesis.

In Europe during the war, the Skull took personal command of many military actions and personally supervised the takeovers and lootings of many cities and towns; in various cases the Skull ordered and supervised the eradication of the entire population of such communities. The Red Skull also organized a "wolf pack" of submarines which preyed upon shipping across the world, often under the Skull's personal command.

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The Red Skull supposedly unmasked. Likely an impostor

At first Hitler took great pride in his protégé's successes and let the Skull have anything he wanted. Hitler thus financed the construction of secret bases for the Skull in various locations throughout the world, many of which were equipped with highly advanced experimental weapons and devices developed by Nazi scientists. The Skull was particularly interested in procuring technological weapons that could be used for the purposes of subversion and warfare. During the war he stole plans for the "nullatron," a device that could control human minds, adapted a space-warping device developed by the cyborg scientist codenamed Brain Drain, and commissioned Nazi scientists to develop a projector which could encircle and suspend sections of cities within spheres of energy.

But while the Skull always admired Hitler for his ideological vision, he was never content with being Hitler's subordinate. The Skull kidnapped and killed many of Hitler's closest advisers and eventually rose to become the second most powerful man in the Third Reich. Now Hitler could no longer effectively control the Skull and came to fear him, especially since the Skull had made little secret of his ambition to supplant Hitler someday.

After the renowned military officer Baron Wolfgang von Strucker had a falling out with Hitler, the Red Skull sent Strucker to Japan to found an organization that would prepare the way for takeovers in the Far East under the Skull's leadership. In the Far East Strucker joined a subversive organization that came to be known as HYDRA, broke his ties with the Skull, became head of HYDRA and built it into a major threat to world peace.

As World War II raged on, Hitler vowed, that if he could not conquer the world, he would destroy it. To achieve this end, the Skull proposed the construction of five gigantic war machines, to be called the Sleepers, which would be hidden in various locations while they generated and stored the power they would need, and then be released at a future date, "Der Tag" ("The Day"), to destroy the Earth if the Allies won. Hitler enthusiastically instructed the Skull to construct the Sleepers, unaware that the Skull intended to use them to conquer the world himself if Hitler's Third Reich fell. In the closing days of the war in Europe, Allied intelligence received reports of a Nazi doomsday plan code-named "Der Tag" to be implemented after Hitler's defeat. However, the Allies had no idea what the plan entailed.

1945

Captain America and his teenage partner Bucky Barnes fought against and thwarted the Skull and his plans many times during the war, both working on their own and operating as members of the Invaders. During the final days of World War II in Europe, Captain America and Bucky were assigned to England to prevent desperate Nazi efforts at sabotaging Allied supply bases there. The Red Skull sent a number of his subordinates, who became known as the Exiles, and a large contingent of loyal German soldiers and their wives to a secret island base ("Exile Island"), where they would organize an army for use in the future.

Suspended Animation

Now that the German defeat was becoming a reality, the Red Skull was more determined than ever to obtain vengeance for his numerous personal defeats by Captain America and Bucky. The Skull assigned Baron Heinrich Zemo to go to England, and, under the cover of stealing an experimental Allied drone plane, to capture or kill Captain America and Bucky. However, the Skull was unaware that the Allies had just secretly parachuted Captain America into beleaguered Berlin to investigate "Der Tag."

Captain America tracked the Skull down to his hidden bunker. The Skull was about to hurl an armed hand grenade at his nemesis when Captain America threw his shield at him. The grenade went off, but the Skull was not killed, thanks to his body armor. He was, however; seriously hurt and partially buried in debris. Thinking he was dying, the Skull defiantly told Captain America that the Sleepers would avenge the Nazis' defeat. Then, suddenly, an Allied attack on Berlin began. An Allied plane dropped a huge blockbuster bomb on the bunker, causing a cave-in that Captain America barely escaped. Captain America was picked up by the Allies and returned to England only to fall into Zemo's trap, which led to Captain America's falling into suspended animation for decades. Support pillars that crisscrossed over the Red Skull when the bunker caved in saved him from being struck by tons of rubble when the bomb hit. The cave-in released an experimental gas from canisters in the bunker which put the Skull into suspended animation during which his wounds slowly healed.

Anomalous Appearances

Still, despite the Red Skull being placed in suspended animation, there were still anomalous appearances, such as when Captain America (Jeff Mace) battled the Red Skull in Hell. These were likely impostors, or the result of other unexplained phenomenon.

However, there was one man who posed as the Red Skull. In the early 1950's, with the original Red Skull assumed to be dead Albert Malik the Communist leader of an Algerian-based spy ring assumed the identity of the Red Skull throughout the course of the 1950s.

Modern Era

Revived

Some years ago, the original Red Skull was found by a search team sent by the subversive organization called THEM, which was actually the ruling council of HYDRA headed by Baron Strucker. Strucker carefully concealed his identity from the Skull after the latter was revived. By this time the first three Sleepers had already been destroyed by the original Captain America, who had emerged from his own state of suspended animation earlier. The Skull agreed to cooperate with THEM and did so just long enough to steal the Cosmic Cube from AIM, which was then one of THEM's subsidiary organizations. This theft led to the Skulls first postwar clash with the original Captain America, who again defeated him.

Believing that with Hitler's death he himself should now rule the world, the Red Skull made repeated attempts at world domination. In his various attacks on world peace he employed the Cosmic Cube, and the army of Exiles, a fragment of HYDRA, and the two final Sleepers, among many other means of conquest. However, the Skull nevertheless repeatedly met defeat, most often through the efforts of the original Captain America.

Seeking an heir, the Red Skull fathered a daughter by a washerwoman on Exile Island relatively soon after his revival. This woman died in childbirth. The Red Skull had the mansion called Skull House built and raised her there. Through advanced biological means he caused her to reach adulthood within an unnaturally short period of time and endowed her with superhuman powers; he named her Mother Superior.

For a time the Red Skull operated in partnership with the original Hate-Monger, who was a clone of Adolph Hitler. However, unwilling to share power even with his former mentor, the Skull eventually put an end to their alliance by entrapping the Hate-Monger's consciousness within a powerless facsimile of the Cosmic Cube.

First Death

The Red Skull learned to his horror that the effects of the experimental gas that had kept him from aging while he was in suspended animation were reversing themselves; as a result, he aged at an unnatural rate of speed until his physical age matched his chronological one, making him so elderly that he would soon die of old age. Determined that he and Captain America should perish together, the Skull had Captain America's ally Nomad brainwashed. Hence Nomad was compelled to dose Captain America's food with a chemical that caused him to age at an unnaturally rapid rate and that undid the effects of the super-soldier serum on his body Later, the Skull captured the now elderly Captain America and injected both of them with a poison that gave them only hours left to live. The two ancient adversaries engaged in hand-to-hand combat, and once more Captain America overpowered the Skull. Defeated, the Skull finally expired due to old age. His body was burned thereafter. Captain America was cured of the effects of the poison, the effects of the super-soldier serum were again activated in his body, and he regained his former youthfulness; in short, Captain America returned fully to normalcy.

Shortly afterward, the criminal Doctor Faustus was apparently attacked by the ghost of the Red Skull after Faustus used holographic images of the Skull in a plot against Captain America.

Cloned Body

Unknown to the world, however, the Nazi scientist Armin Zola had preserved the mind of Shmidt at death, and transferred it into a clone of Steve Rogers. Alive again, Skull denounced Nazism as an outdated philosophy, and became determined to destroy America from within, using its own capitalism. Remaining behind the scenes as the Red Skull, he created or funded the creation of several different subversive groups, including Ultimatum, the Watchdogs, Scourge, the Resistants, and Power Brokers, Inc. Through his agent on the Senate-sanctioned "Commission," he masterminded their investigation and eventual replacement of Steve Rogers as Captain America, leading to John Walker taking up the role. The Skull then began a campaign to cause Walker's breakdown, using Walker's ever-increasing instability and violence to besmirch the reputation of Captain America. During this time, in combat with Steve Rogers (who was then known as the Captain,) Schmidt accidentally dosed himself with the Dust of Death, giving him a permanent "red skull" visage.

Civil War

The Red Skull was assassinated by the mysterious Winter Soldier, under orders from the renegade former Soviet general Aleksander Lukin, who wanted to possess the new Cosmic Cube the Skull had manufactured. When the Skull was shot, he attempted to use the Cube to switch bodies with Lukin to survive, but as the Cube was still weak he only managed to transfer his mind into Lukin's body, so that the two enemies are trapped together, waging a constant war for dominance which the Red Skull seemed to be progressively winning. During a plot to lure out Captain America, Red Skull/Lukin recruited several German skinheads and made them the successors to the Master Man. He then had these soldiers, dubbed the "Master Race," launch an attack on London, which was thwarted by Captain America, Spitfire, and Union Jack. Then, Red Skull/Lukin activated a Sleeper, a robot programmed for mass destruction, that was presumably created by Doctor Doom. The robot damaged a significant portion of the new London Kronas HQ, and was ultimately destroyed by Captain America and Bucky. In the aftermath, Red Skull sent a videotape, announcing to the world his return, followed by Lukin holding a press conference condemning the actions of both the Red Skull and Captain America, and supporting the Superhero Registration Act. Then, in his office, Red Skull introduced Lukin to his old/new associates, Crossbones and Sin.

With America's superheroes divided over the SRA during the Superhero Civil War, the Skull manipulated events to his own ends, with the aid of Doctor Faustus, Doctor Doom, and Arnim Zola. His plans involved the reunion of Captain America and his former lover Sharon Carter, who was being manipulated by Faustus.

Death of Captain America

In the immediate aftermath of the Civil War, the Skull put his plans into action, arranging for Crossbones to shoot Captain America as he entered a courthouse in New York City; in the ensuing chaos, Carter, acting under Faustus' mental directive, assassinated Captain America. This, however, was only the first phase of the Skull's evil plan. Upon the exposure of his being Lukin, the Skull faked his death, and initiated the second part of his plan: using Kronas Corporation's vast holdings to economically cripple the United States, before having S.H.I.E.L.D. agents brainwashed by Doctor Faustus open fire on crowds of protesters in front of the White House. The Red Skull continued his assault by engineering a riot by placing Kronas security troops and drugged water in a protest on the Lincoln Monument.

All of this had apparently been to elevate Gordon Wright, his puppet politician, in the public's eye with being credited as "resolving" the situations, as well as surviving a (staged) attack by the Serpent Squad. Once elected, Wright would lead the country directly into a police state secretly controlled by the Red Skull. The Skull also planed to transfer his consciousness into Sharon's unborn child, apparently sired by Steve Rogers himself and potentially having inherited his Project Rebirth enhancements.

Both schemes failed because of the impatience and incompetence of the Skull's daughter - her near-fatal attack on Sharon Carter caused her to lose the baby, and she intentionally botched her pseudo-assassination of Gordon Wright by attempting to kill him for real. And as Faustus surreptitiously tampered with Sharon's programming, she was able to rebel, and before escaping shot Lukin to death.

This wasn't the end of Red Skull, since Armin Zola had seconds earlier transferred his mind to one of his spare robotic bodies, but after having his current form damaged by the 1950's Captain America, he was unable to return back to Red Skull, essentially trapping him in his current robotic form for the time being.

Captain America: Reborn

A year later, it is revealed that the Skull had in fact trapped Rogers' body in a fixed point in time-space. It was his intention to transfer his mind into Rogers' body and supplant his consciousness. Unfortunately, when Sharon broke the connection, as she was implanted with chronal tracers designed to draw Rogers to her, it unstuck him in time, causing him to relive all the events of his life. Norman Osborn, current Director of H.A.M.M.E.R., learned this from Zola, who had managed to transfer himself to another body. Osborn realized that having Captain America leading his Avengers, even with the Red Skull in control, would increase his popularity. He released both Crossbones and Sin to retrieve him. Traveling to Latveria, where Zola and Doctor Doom, who had provided the Skull with the equipment necessary for his plans, the Skull managed to take control of his archnemesis' body.

The Skull planned on returning to America, where he would tell the new President that "Captain America" had returned. He also intended to play along with Osborn's plan for the moment. But first, he intended on defeating the underground Avengers, who were tailing him. A fight broke out at the Washington monument, both in the physical and mental world. In the latter, Rogers had managed to break through the illusion that had supplanted his consciousness. Both he and Bucky fought against the Skull. But when the latter had the Skull/Rogers at his mercy, he couldn't bring himself to kill his old friend. The Skull took advantage of this and prepared to kill Bucky. Luckily Rogers managed to overcome the Skull's mental control. After returning to his mechanical body, Sharon struck him with a device to prevent his escape, not knowing it would enlarge his size. Shmidt battled the Avengers and died a final death due to the combined efforts of Sharon and both Captain Americas.