When was the SS or Schutzstaffel established?

April 4, 1925 is correct because the SS began that day as a small protection unit for Adolf Hitler within the re-founded Nazi Party. Initially subordinate to the SA and led by Julius Schreck (followed by Joseph Berchtold and Erhard Heiden), it stayed minor until Heinrich Himmler took over in 1929 and expanded it rapidly. Context: the SS evolved into a powerful apparatus—overseeing party security, political policing, the concentration camp system, and the Waffen-SS—central to Nazi repression and the Holocaust. To remember the date, think 4/4/25: two fours for the two “S” letters, and note it predates Nazi rule (1933), underscoring the SS’s roots in the party’s early years.