Find the word definition

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Brown Shirt

generic term for "Nazi, fascist," especially of the thuggish sort, 1934, originally (1922) in reference to the German Sturmabteilung, Nazi militia founded 1921; they were called Brown Shirts in English because of their uniforms.

Usage examples of "brown shirt".

Ayrlyn was silent as they rode past a cot where a woman in tattered gray trousers and a faded brown shirt hoed a garden, bearing a child in a backpack.

Then he folded the brown shirt and the trousers he had not worn since returning to Nylan and slipped them inside.

Shortly, an older and taller man, taller even than Brental, over four cubits in height, his brown shirt and trousers streaked with whitish sawdust, stepped through the open sliding door of the mill.

She wears a sleeveless homespun brown shirt that reaches mid-thigh over loose gray trousers that stop at mid-calf.

The tallest wore a faded gray vest over a worn brown shirt and patched brown trousers.

A Mexican boy in a brown shirt was bringing in a small herd of goats.

He was dressed in a light-brown shirt and overalls, obviously his own conception of what constituted the well-dressed submariner's uniform, and for the first time in our acquaintance he didn't smile a greeting.

Biggun Blaylock was wearing camouflage-print overalls and a dark brown shirt.