Origin

British Army Intelligence officer Aylmer Gregson was stationed in Berlin before the Second World War when he was kidnapped by the Nazis, thrown into a concentration camp and brutally tortured. He later escaped and orchestrated a breakout of his fellow inmates, whom he assembled into the Deathless Men underground army.

Gregson underwent plastic surgery to make himself look like Gestapo officer Colonel Manfred Von Reich. He assassinated the real Von Reich and stole his identity to become second-in-command of the Nazi secret police. While posing as Von Reich he continued building Deathless Men resistance groups in German-occupied nations.

Creation

Jack One and the Deathless Men were created by writer KD Frost and debuted in the first V for Vengeance story published in The Wizard #1004 (August 1942). The V for Vengeance saga continued in other DC Thomson comics, including The Hornet, The Hotspur, The Victor, Red Dagger and Commando.

Character Development

In the earliest V for Vengeance stories Gregson created the identity of Colonel Von Reich in order to infiltrate the Gestapo. Later stories revised his origin so that Von Reich already existed as a separate character, and that Jack one assassinated him and stole his identity.

Following World War II, Jack One and the Deathless Men shifted their operations to the United States and continued hunting Nazi war criminals who’d evaded capture by the Allies.