All female comic book characters are created to make a statement. However, very few are more iconic than Peggy Carter – a fictional character that appears in Marvel Comics. Peggy became a fan favorite because even though she did not have any superpowers, she was able to do things that other humans could not. She would go on to receive more attention for being the love interest of Captain America.
Unfortunately, Peggy Carter and Captain America’s relationship came to an end (or so we thought) after he was presumed to have died in the artic. Subsequent events after this, however, reveal that Capt. America aka Steve Rogers, was always Peggy Carter’s husband and he was the unknown soldier she married.
Peggy Carter was Created to be a Supporting Character To Captain America
Peggy Carter was created by Marvel Comics to be a supporting character in books and other productions featuring Captain America. She first appeared in the Tales of Suspense #75 in 1966. Peggy would later be the star of her own short-lived television show, Marvel’s Agent Carter that explored her background and history, depicting her as an expert in espionage.
As a teenager, Peggy joined the French resistance where she became a skilled fighter. While she does not have any superpowers, she was still able to do things that set her apart from other average humans. This allowed her rise to the top to become one of the most prominent agents of the Strategic Scientific Reserve (SSR), a top-secret Allied war agency formed to battle HYDRA – the Nazi special weapons division – during and after World War II.
While working with SSR, Peggy Carter befriended Steve Rodgers, a candidate for the Super Soldier Serum that the SSR had developed to make an army of super soldiers. Rodgers ended up being the only super-soldier created and Peggy assisted him in becoming the world’s first superhero with the alias Captain America. The two would go on to extensively work together and so it wasn’t a surprise that they ended up falling in love.
Peggy Carter and Captain America’s Relationship History
Peggy Carter and Captain America became a couple after they worked together extensively. She served alongside the superhero on several missions. However, after Captain America is frozen in the artic and presumed dead (but actually in suspended animation), she moves on to live a quiet life that sees her get married to an unnamed soldier and become one of the founders of S.H.I.E.L.D.
About 70 years later, at the beginning of the 21st century, Rogers returns from suspended animation to meet a now-elderly Carter who has developed Alzheimer’s disease. She barely recognizes him but is able to tell him that the world has changed. Peggy would later die peacefully in her sleep and Rodgers would serve as one of her pallbearers.
While this appeared to be the end of the Peggy Carter and Captain America love story, subsequent storylines in the Marvel Cinematic Universe suggest that the duo had always been together and Rogers was her “unnamed” husband.
The Identity of Peggy Carter’s Husband
The identity of Peggy Carter’s husband was never outrightly mentioned in any of the storylines in the comic books and movie adaptations. It was only said that she ended up with an unnamed soldier.
As the story goes, Carter’s unnamed husband served as a member of a battalion of over one thousand soldiers that fought behind the German line just outside Stalingrad. She was fighting alongside him when the battalion got trapped by a blizzard and was pinned down by a HYDRA blockade for several months. The soldiers were later rescued by Captain America in 1945.
After the war, when Captain America who Peggy fell in love with gets frozen in the artic and is presumed dead, she married the soldier. The duo would go on to have two kids; a son and a daughter. Aside from this, no more information was given about him and he has not appeared in, or been talked about, in any subsequent Marvel project. As a result, Peggy Carter’s husband’s identity has been a point of discussion for many years as fans have floated different theories on who the person might be.
Other than Steve Rogers, those who have been named to be her husband include Jason Wilkes and Daniel Sousa who featured in the Agent Carter series. However, there are more storylines that back up the theory of Rogers being her husband rather than both Sousa and Wilkes.
At the end of the second season of Agent Carter, Peggy shares a passionate kiss with Sousa and it is believed that they end up together. She had previously kissed Wilkes on the show, prompting speculations about him later being her husband but nothing was made out of the whole idea. Her relationship with Sousa was the more tangible of the two but no one is quite sure about what happens next because the series was canceled after its second season.
Why Her Husband was Always Thought to be Captain America
If the Peggy Carter story was allowed to end after season two of Agent Carter, the storyline of her being with Sousa might have been the most plausible but it does not add up to what happens in the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe productions.
In 2023, in Avengers: Endgame when the superheroes complete the Time Heist to defeat Thanos and return the Infinity Stones to their correct places, Rogers chooses to return to Carter by time travel to 1949 and the two would go on to enjoy a full married life together. This is further backed up by the fact that in 1970, a picture of Steve is seen in Peggy’s office on her desk.
If Carter ended up with any other man, it would certainly be odd for her to have a picture of another man she dated years ago on her desk instead of the person she is married to and has children with.
Before this revelation in Avengers: Endgame, no one was quite sure about this storyline. In Captain America: The Winter Soldier in 2014, a video of Peggy’s interview from 1953 was played in the Smithsonian. In it, she talks about Steve and gets emotional. It is mind-boggling to think that Carter was getting emotional about a person she was supposed to have already been with at the time.
Another scene that creates confusion is when Peggy sees a young Steve who had returned from suspended animation. Carter is surprised and ecstatic to see him, raising the question of why she would be surprised to see someone she had always been married to.
It has been explained that this happened because of her Alzheimer’s disease. On why she was emotional about Rogers in a video from 1953, it is believed that she must have recalled Rogers’ supposed death which was traumatic to her. Recalling that she almost lost the love of her life broke her down.
Producers of MCU reveal that Captain America was able to use time travel to go back in time and be with his long-lost love without altering the future. He instead existed in a different timeline. This means that there might have always been two Capt. Americas; the superhero and Peggy Carter’s unnamed husband.
