The photos I've seen of him as a WW1 soldier has him wearing a more conventional wide mustache, but by the time he was in jail for his 1923 putsch attempt, he had the little Charlie Chaplin mustache he became infamous for. Does anyone know when he went from the former type to the latter? (This is a serious question.)

German Army mustache regulations were put in place after chemical warfare use started. Too much facial hair and a gasmask won't gt a good seal and so won't work. It's my understanding (read somewhere) that Hitlers' short mustache was in line with the regulation. Why he kept it after the war? Who knows, maybe because he was gassed? Hope this helps.

There are pictures of him even after the gas attack with him wearing a regular mustache. I have also seen pictures of him in the 1920's with a regular one.

I have no idea of when he switched.

I can only add that after having a 'Van Dyke"-style mustache for about a year, I would shave it every day to keep the shape, and every day it would get smaller, and smaller, and smaller, because of trimming the edges...prerty soon, I just conceded to the reality that one day it would look ridiculous, and just shaved it clean off! LOL!

Ola Guys

Interesting question... I don't know for how far the next story is true but if you watch the documentary "Hitler the rise of evil with Robert Carlyle as Hitler.. (Somebody which I can't remember at the moment) during the time of the speeches in the Burgerbraukeller advices him to do something for which everybody will recognize him. Eventually he stands in front of the mirror and covers the ends of his moustache showing only the square under his nose.

But I rather think the gasmask story to be more true
Hitler was ordered to trim his moustache