THE BLACKSMITH OF BRANDYWINE
As we marched into Brandywine, it was a sight to see:
A giant of a man with a hammer in his hand beneath the old oak tree,
And all around him on the ground, in fatal disarray,
Lay a score of men who'll never fight again, or travel on the King's highway.
We dug his grave, covered him o'er, and sadly wept a tear,
Spent the day ridin' on our way till we met with a musketeer.
From him we learned the story of a brave and angry man,
Who undertook to the British enemy with a hammer in his hand.
Make it one! For Washington and all his gallant men,
One for the girl that once was mine;
Make it one! For the darling boy I'll never see again,
And don't forget the Blacksmith of Brandywine!
In Chestertown there lived a man away from the cannon's roar.
Of manner mild, his woman and child, no man could ever love more;
But the Tories spoke of a plot one day to waylay Washington,
And he left his home and family alone.  To the general he did run.
His errand done, he journeyed home but sorrow there he found.
By British guns his wife and son lay still on the cold hard ground.
The blacksmith reached for his heavy sledge and he gave a practice swing,
And they say on the line at Brandywine, you could hear that hammer sing.
Make it one! For Washington and all his gallant men,
One for the girl that once was mine;
Make it one! For the darling boy I'll never see again,
And don't forget the Blacksmith of Brandywine!

BACKGROUND/POWERS:  Terrible in the field at Brandywine was the figure of a man armed only with a hammer, who plunged into the ranks of the enemy, heedless of his own life, yet seeming to escape their shots and sabre cuts by magic, and with Thor strokes beat them to the earth.  But yesterday war had been to him a distant rumour, a thing as far from his cottage at Dilworth as if it had been in Europe, but he had revolted at a plot that he had overheard to capture Washington and had warned the general.  In revenge the Tories had burned his cottage, and his wife and baby had perished in the flames.   All day he had sat beside the smoking ruins, unable to weep, unable to think, unable almost to suffer, except dumbly, for as yet he could not understand it.  But when the drums were heard they roused the tiger in him, and gaunt with sleeplessness and hunger he joined his countrymen and ranged like Ajax on the field.  Every cry for quarter was in vain: to every such appeal he had but one reply, his wife's name--Mary.

Near the end of the fight he lay beside the road, his leg broken, his flesh torn, his life ebbing from a dozen wounds.  A wagoner, hasting to join the American retreat, paused to give him drink.  "I've only five minutes more of life in me," said the smith.  "Can you lift me into that tree and put a rifle in my hands?" The powerful teamster raised him to the crotch of an oak, and gave him the rifle and ammunition that a dying soldier had dropped there.  A band of red-coats came running down the road, chasing some farmers.  The blacksmith took careful aim; there was a report, and the leader of the band fell dead.  A pause; again a report rang out, and a trooper sprawled upon the ground.  The marksman had been seen, and a lieutenant was urging his men to hurry on and cut him down.   There was a third report, and the lieutenant reeled forward into the road, bleeding and cursing.  "That's for Mary," gasped the blacksmith.  The rifle dropped from his hands, and he, too, sank lifeless against the boughs.

But deeds such as these, fuelled by such powerful emotions to catch at the heart, the mind, sometimes don't end with the life of the doer.  A year to the day after the smith fell in this war of independence, a private war he fought to avenge his butchered family, something awoke from his grave.  Something seeking still more justice against the oppressors of the world.

The hammer was the key to this revenant's existence, a simple blacksmith's sledge it still appeared to be, but within it now seethed forces beyond mortal comprehension, fuelled by the growing legend of its deeds.  It drew the massive smith from his grave and drove him into action across the countryside.  Strong in life, as all in his profession, his strength was now trebled, making him one of the mightiest to then walk the earth.  He could ignore wounds that would fell even the hardiest of foes, and his body would slowly repair even the gravest damages done to it.  And the sledge, it could fairly hum with menace, shattering rock into gravel and punching holes in solid iron.  As much a part of him as his own arm, he could call it flying to hand merely by willing it so.
 
And like his own arm, he can be hurt through it.

Having wandered the world since the late 18th century, he has seen history unfold as it happened, fought in countless wars and skirmishes on the side of the oppressed, he has a rather unique perspective on the world and the motivations of the people that inhabit it.  He doesn't condone totalitarian rule -- he cannot, by the very nature of the power that animates him.
He is the Smith.

SKILLS: Smith is fluent in Spanish (learned while doing some work on the Panama Canal in the years prior to WWI), Russian (during the time he spend there in the 1830s and 40s, mostly from a drinking companion, Karl) Cantonese (from those he worked on the Canadian National Railway with in the 1880s), some rudimentary terms in Mohawk (from his ironworking days building skyscrapers in New York) and some appropriate German expletives (picked up during the World Wars.)

Smith is not so much of a technical wizard as being quite competent in, well, just about every segment of manual labour.  He has put his time in with stonemasonry, carpentry, ditch digging, demolition, car mechanics, etc.  If it's manual labour, he knows how to do it.  He has also started to make inroads into higher-tech devices, but has not had the sheer amount of experience on them.  He is familiar with how microchips are put together though, for example.

He has considerable knowledge with geography, and a good chunk of the history as it happened.  From his perspective, of course, which means a fair bit of it could be suspect.  Smith has also met many people over the years and has many contacts in various strata of society.

DESCRIPTION: Standing six foot four and a full axehandle across the shoulders, Smith is a massive man, his frame showing the dense, powerful muscle that only comes from hard, hard work. His hair is worn longer than is fashionable and is moderately unkempt, signs of indifference more than any specific style; more neatly trimmed is his light beard, most likely because he simply hasn't shaved for several days.  His clothing is decidedly plain, heavy-duty wear with names like Carhartt and Lee's.  A battered brown oilskin jacket that's seen better days stretches across his broad shoulders, falling past his knees just short of his worn boots.
 

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