 He was one of the senior members in Colonel von Epp's ("Bavarian Free Corps for Border Patrol East"), formed in Ohrdruf in April 1919, which finally overturned the Munich Soviet Republic by force of arms on 3 May 1919.In 1919 he joined the German Workers' Party (DAP), which the following year became the National Socialist German Workers Party (NSDAP).Not long afterward he met Adolf Hitler, and they became political allies and close friends.