This picture was taken in August 1929 during the 4th NSDAP Reich Party Congress in Nuremberg. The party rally led to violent confrontations between National Socialists and Communists, causing the Nuremberg city council to prevent the party conventions from being held in Nuremberg for the following two years. This colored photograph shows 22-year-old Horst Wessel (1907-1930), leader of a Berlin SA storm troop, during the SA’s march through Nuremberg. In addition to uniformed SA men, some civilians can also be seen returning the Hitler salute. Wessel had joined the Nazi Party in 1926 as a law student, but dropped out of college two years later and made a living with odd jobs. A protégé of the Nazi Party’s Berlin district leader, Joseph Goebbels, he quickly rose within the SA. The SA storm troop he led was known as a brutal gang of thugs that sought out confrontations with communist and social democratic groups. When Wessel was shot dead in his apartment by a KPD member in 1930, Nazi propaganda stylized him into a martyr. A battle hymn he had written was named after him and declared the party anthem.