Adolf Hitler was born on April 20, 1889 in Braunau-am-Inn, Austria to Alois (father) who was a Customs Officer on the border crossing and Klara (mother). Among the survivors, Adolf was the third child of his parents along with his sister, Paula born in 1896 (he had one younger brother, Edmund, born before Paula but died at age of 6).
From his childhood, Adolf had no interest in study and carried poor academic grades. He had an artistic mind and was solely interested in becoming an artist. He did not even complete his schooling. His father died when he was 13, and was brought up by his mother, Klara. He developed interest in Politics when he was just sixteen years old.
Adolf was 19 when he was left alone without support when Klara died of Cancer in 1908. He had no other option but to move to Vienna and to earn living for himself. During his early days at Vienna, he spent nights anywhere he found place to sleep and ate at the charity kitchens. He sold sketches and paintings; he even painted posters to make living.
Hitler traveled many places in search of a job. In 1914 (beginning of World War I), he was inducted in the 16th Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment of German Army. Hitler displayed courage at the battlefield and for his bravery he was promoted to the post of Corporal, he was also honored with First Class and Second Class Iron Crosses. For the next couple of years, Hitler served his regiment and from December 1918 to March 1919 worked at a Prisoner-of-War camp at Traunstein. After returning from Traunstein, he became a part of local army organization, which was a group of people who did not want the soldiers to turn towards communism or pacifism.
Hitler entered into politics after getting an opportunity in form of an offer to become member of The German Worker’s Party, which was given to him by party founder Anion Drexler. Hitler impressed Anion Drexler when he openly criticized the speaker of the party in one general meeting. Anion made him seventh official in September 1919 and handed over the responsibility of publicity of the party. Hitler began taking public meetings and even was successful in attracting audience right from his first public speech. On 1st April 1920 party’s was changed to ‘The National Socialist German Workers Party’ and Hitler represented Swastika as a symbol of his party. Slowly Hitler formed a group of men who worked for him and helped him in gaining the supreme position in the party. He threatened those who were opposing him and made them accept him as a leader. Near 1921, Hitler took the control of the party in his hands along with all the dictatorial powers.
After becoming very strong, he planned to take over the local Bavarian Government (which is known as ‘Beer-Hall-Putsch’). He plotted kidnapping of all the Bavarian government officials and gain control over the government, but was unsuccessful in his plan and was sentenced for five years. He was sent to Landsberg prison. Adolf did not cease his activities here; he continued his work from the jail. He tried to gain publicity from jail and was even successful in doing so. In prison, he got his thoughts and philosophy written down with the help from Rudolf Hess (which was published as ‘Mein Kampf’).
In December 1924, Hitler was released from the prison only in six months, well before his sentence. After getting out of the prison, Hitler gathered his supporters and once again started gaining power by increasing the number of members of his party. Within next couple of years, Hitler and his party gained a reasonable support in Germany and set up Organizations to help the party in gaining power and funds.
In year 1929, after worldwide recession, the Reichstag was dissolved and elections were held. After the elections, Hitler’s Nazi Party became second largest party in the Reichstag. Along with this, Hitler slowly started gaining support from Army and industrialists.
In 1932, Hitler accepted German citizenship and fought election against Hindenburg. After failing for first time, Hindenburg managed to gain majority and was invited to form government. In the same year, General Schleicher and Nazis plotted a conspiracy against the government and demanded for re-elections. Near September 1932, Nazi managed to gain power but still had many difficulties in total control. After implementing many tactics, gaining support from communists and other parties by pressurizing them, Hitler was invited to become Chancellor. After gaining complete control over the Reichstag and bringing the government under pressure, Nazis burned the Reichstag and accused communists of destruction of the Reichstag. As a further step, communists were banned and Hitler and his party (Nazi) were given all the controls and dictatorial powers. They suppressed almost all those who could oppose the Nazi party from gaining control of the government. In July 14 1933, Nazi party passed the act that Nazi Party was the only party that was to be allowed in Germany, all the other parties and organizations were banned and were forced to give up opposing to Nazi party and Hitler. Jews were considered non-Germans, persecuted and ostracized (find meaning of both) and were not given any rights. Jews were banned from doing any civil services, law and medical practices etc. They were even banned from entering public places.
Hitler appointed people to help in making Germany become self-sufficient within next four years. In 1935, he threw off the Versailles Treaty and ordered to secretly increase the number of soldiers in the army from 100,000 to more than 400,000, construction of huge war ships, construction of submarines, build military aircrafts etc. He planned to increase territories of Germany by attacking the neighboring countries. He began his mission by marching into Austria and then Czechoslovakia. Poland was his next target, which he and his army invaded on 1 September 1939. The Second World War was started and Germans and their tactics, which they called ‘Blitzkrieg’, dominated its first phase. After Poland, German army marched into Denmark, Norway, Holland, Belgium, Luxemburg and France in 1940. After getting a tough fight from Britain, Hitler then marched into the Balkans and North Africa, Greece, Yugoslavia, the island of Crete and Cyrenaica.
Hitler then decided to invade Russia. He marched into Russia with his army in 1941. He was overoptimistic about his victory and overlooked the facts about the Russian strength, America-Russia Ally and possible loss of his force. He changed his decisions and targets every now and then and never concentrated on one target (Moscow). Some of his troops faced setbacks, which made him loose faith in his own generals, on the other hand, his health was deteriorating every minute as a side effect of medications he was undergoing. As an effect of all this, Hitler started losing all his senses, he never listened to any of his generals and started taking insane decisions, which were sure signs of fall of Germany in the war.
In his last days, Hitler lost control over his mind completely. He hid himself in a bunker in Berlin and believed that his two rockets V-1 and V-2, which he called his ‘Secret Weapons’, would save him and change the final outcome of the war. He developed an impression that he still had a strong and very big army and directed it to invade countries. On 19 March 1945, Hitler ordered destruction of all the industries in Germany and kill his own people.
On 29 April 1945 Hitler married Eva Braun and the following day both committed suicide. Hitler shot himself through his mouth just two minutes after Eva Braun swallowed poison pills and committed suicide. Hitler ordered to burn his body along with Eva Braun in petrol into the garden of the Reich Chancellery.