Now the answer is clear. Article in The Sunday Telegraph [found via Great War Fiction blog] tells:
A previously unpublished essay by a writer who served alongside Hitler in the First World War trenches reveals that the future Führer was only obeying orders when he shaped his moustache into its tightly-clipped style. He was instructed to do so in order that it would fit under the respirator masks, introduced in response to British mustard gas attacks.
Writer Alexander Moritz Frey met with Hitler at 1915: “A pale, tall man tumbled down into the cellar after the first shells of the daily evening attacks had begun to fall, fear and rage glowing in his eyes.”
This is something new to historians, who mostly believed that Hitler was following fashion of that time. Anyway, trimming didn`t make to fit gas mask better and Hitler got gassed and temporarily blinded in 1918.
Check the article for how he looked with big Prussian moustache.
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