members of a private army organized by the Nazi party and Adolf Hitler (1889 - 1945, dictator of Germany from 1933 to 1945) in 1920 as an instrument of terror. In support of Hitler's rise to power, the storm troopers fought communists and others who tried to break upNazi rallies. By October 1923, they numbered 15,000 men, armed with machine guns and rifles. Hitler used brown-shirted uniforms and the swastika emblem to give his followers a sense of unity. They were known in Germany as Sturmabteilung which literally means "storm division." —PDC Volume 7 Approved Glossary