Portrait of Yang Xianyi
Yang Xianyi, who was praised by Dr. Sun Yat-sen as the "father of the revolutionary air force", believes that everyone knows something about his deeds, especially he presided over the design of China's first military aircraft "Leshiwen" No. 1. What made the Chinese people first see the power of the revolutionary air force was an air force combat mission that he commanded and participated in the war 100 years ago.
In July 1923, after the successful test flight of the "Le Shiwen" No. 1 aircraft designed by Yang Xianyi in Dashatou, Sun Yat-sen and his wife took a photo in front of the plane
In 1918, due to the collusion between the Gui warlord Lu Rongting and the Beiyang government, the first Dharma Protection Movement failed, and Dr. Sun Yat-sen was forced to leave Guangdong for Shanghai. He ordered the Cantonese army led by Chen Jiongming and Xu Chongzhi to retreat to Zhangzhou, Fujian Province, and the revolutionary air force led by Yang Xianyi was also among them.
Mo Rongxin, then the governor of Guangdong
In 1920, the Guangdong army returned from Zhangzhou to expel Mo Rongxin, Chen Bingkun, Tan Haoming, Ma Ji and other Guizhou warlord groups that were occupying Guangdong. At that time, the Guangdong Army was divided into two routes: Chen Jiongming was the commander-in-chief and commander of the First Army, Deng Hao was the chief of staff, Xu Chongzhi was the commander of the Second Army, Chiang Kai-shek was the chief of staff, and Yang Xianyi was the commander-in-chief of the Air Force.
Yang Xianyi's flying license in the United States
At that time, in addition to coordinating with the army, the air force's task was to fly to various parts of Guangdong Province to distribute leaflets with the words "Expel Tan Chen Moma" and other words, to arouse the people behind the enemy to arm themselves to participate in the rebellion. Seeing the plane distribute leaflets from the air like the scattered flowers of the goddess of heaven is the first time for the Chinese people.
The formation of aircraft that bombed Guangzhou on September 27, 1920
On the afternoon of September 27, 1920, Yang Xianyi, Zhang Huichang, and the hired American pilot Wiener flew two seaplanes and a water patrol plane purchased from the United States from Macao to Guangzhou to carry out combat missions. When the plane dropped bombs over the Governor's Office on Dexuan Street (present-day Dongfeng West Road) under Guanyin Mountain (present-day Yuexiu Mountain), just as the Guangdong Overseer Mo Rongxin and other Gui warlords held a military meeting at the office, they heard that bombs had fallen from the sky.
The Declaration of 29 September 1920 reported the bombing of the Overseer's Office
This was the earliest air-to-ground battle in Guangzhou, and Feng Free (a Native of Nanhai, Guangdong, one of the first members of the League, who pioneered the abbreviation of the "Three People's Principles"), commented on the matter in his book "The History of the Revolution":
Feng Free's "Revolutionary History" has a cover titled by the Kuomintang elders
Dating back to the Xinhai (Revolution) to the ninth year of the People's Republic of China, the Air Force of the Overseas Chinese Party in the Americas organized five times,......。 The fourth time of the first two, three or four, or because of technical inadequacies, or because of organizational defects, or because of the short period of time, or because of service infidelity, can not be applied practically. To the people of the Ninth Battle of Mo began to play the skin gong, now the words of the air force, drinking water and thinking of the source, should also know the essence.
Aviation Exhibition organized by the Aviation Association in 1932
Looking back on Yang Xianyi's short life devoted to the cause of revolutionary aviation, it can be said that he is not afraid of wealth and death, but is completely to follow Dr. Sun Yat-sen's revolutionary ideal of "saving the country through aviation".
Yang Xianyi's ancestral home about Yang Zhukun's introduction
At that time, the revolutionary government led by Dr. Sun Yat-sen had financial difficulties and air force personnel had little treatment to speak of; and Yang Xianyi, as a "rich second generation", his father Yang Zhukun was a giant in the rice and sugar industry who lived in Honolulu, USA. However, in order to help Dr. Sun Yat-sen establish the Revolutionary Air Force, the Yang family poured out their family wealth and went bankrupt.
Feng Ru's portrait
From the invention of the airplane by the Wright brothers in 1903 and the successful test flight, to the time when Dr. Sun Yat-sen founded the Revolutionary Air Force in Guangdong, but in just over a decade, due to the relatively poor safety of the aircraft, flight accidents occurred from time to time, resulting in the death of many pilots, including the "father of Chinese aviation" Feng Ru (Guangdong Enping). It can be said that flying an airplane was a matter of nine deaths at that time.
On the aviation anniversary day in 1934, the Guangdong Air Force performed an air show
In 1923, Yang Xianyi led a fleet of aircraft to fight against Chen Jiongming's rebels, and on September 20, when he was directing a mine modification bomb test on a seaplane on the White Sand Front of Lake Borome, he was killed on the spot because of the accidental explosion of the mine. Later, with the approval of the then National Government, September 20 every year was "Aviation Commemoration Day".
Yang Xianyi's ancestral home is located in Beitai Village, Nan district, Zhongshan City
Nowadays, when people come to Beitai Village in the Southern District of Zhongshan City, which has the reputation of "the hometown of the Chinese Air Force", and see the simple ancestral home of the Yang family, which is in stark contrast with the many beautiful overseas Chinese houses in the local area, can they not be awe-inspired by the patriotic feelings of Yang Zhukun and Yang Xianyi's father and son of "destroying the family and relieving difficulties"?
Source:
The Vicissitudes of the Guangdong Air Force of the Republic of China (by Zheng Zixiang)
A History of the Revolution (by Feng Liberty)
Sun Yat-sen and Guangzhou in the Post-Xinhai Era (by Li Suimei and Zhu Xiaoqiu)
"The Xinhai Revolution and Macao" (by Sheng Yonghua and Zhang Lei)
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