On March 26, 2010, in a special care ward of Yuebei Hospital in Shaoguan City, Guangdong Province, there lived an old man who was usually kind and kind, and doctors and nurses only knew that he was a retired cadre of a certain organ.
One day, he asked his family to bring paper and pencil, and with his hand with a hanging needle, he wrote eight words with trembling: "Don't forget the national shame and revitalize China." ”
This made the nurses and doctors present wonder: What is the identity of the old man?
Just late that night, the elderly Li Erxi died due to ineffective medical treatment, and a few days after his death, many media reporters poured into Shaoguan Yuebei Hospital, and Li Erxi's glorious deeds were reported by the media.
Only then did the doctors and nurses know that the old man was a great anti-Japanese hero, and admiration was born.
The old man's name was Li Erxi, and he was the same artilleryman who killed Japanese Lieutenant General Norihide Abe on the battlefield of Loess Ridge. However, as an ordinary artilleryman, how did he have the opportunity to kill Japanese Lieutenant General Norihide Abe?
Li Erxi was born in 1921 in Qijiazhuang Village, Shangzhai Town, Lingqiu County, Shanxi Province, and his parents died when he was thirteen years old. After his brother went out to serve as a soldier, he was never heard from, and he lived alone on the few acres of thin land left by his parents.
When he was a little older, he went to herd cattle, horses, and mules for the landlord's house. Li Erxi is a person with a heart, and others only feed them with cattle and horses, and nothing else. Li Erxi not only saw his physical condition by eating and drinking from cattle and horses, but also learned to treat livestock.
The so-called skills are not pressurized.
When the Anti-Japanese War broke out, Li Erxi had already become a strong boy of sixteen or seventeen years old. In September 1937, after the victory of Pingxingguan, Nie Rongzhen, commander of the Jin-Cha-Ji forces, drove his troops to the vicinity of Li Erxi's hometown and stationed them.
Li Erxi, who was active by nature, often helped the Eighth Route Army run errands and did not tire of it.
Cow herding children
One day, the troops offered to enrich a war horse, and Li Erxi volunteered to help select it, and with his help, the troops bought a good war horse. And Li Erxi also helped the Red Army heal the sick horses. The officers and men of the unit all thought that Li Erxi was a clever child. I couldn't help but like it.
Li Erxi was recommended by everyone to join Yang Chengwu's independent regiment. His daily job is to raise and herd horses. Became a "bow horse" in the army.
Li Erxi is naturally active, coupled with the loss of his parents in the early years, so he has many ideas and strong hands-on ability.
One day, he was about to lead a horse to feed, passing a courtyard, and he was attracted by what he saw. He tied his horse to the entrance of the courtyard and immediately burrowed into the courtyard. It turned out that there were several mortars in the courtyard. These mortars were captured by Yang Chengwu's independent regiment from the enemy in the Battle of Pingxingguan. Because there were no special artillerymen in the independent regiment, these mortars remained idle in the courtyard.
Li Erxi felt very novel, so he rushed to the ground and fiddled with it. And this move of his was looked at by Yang Chengwu, who nodded while watching, as if he was calculating something.
Soon, the independent regiment also began to form its own artillery company, and Li Erxi was selected by Yang Chengwu to enter the artillery company, becoming the first generation of artillery in the independent regiment. Li Erxi was so excited that he couldn't sleep, and sat in front of the mortar all day to study.
Old Man Li Erxi once recalled: "The chief especially liked my cleverness, so he named me to go to the artillery company." ”
As Yang Chengwu judged, Li Erxi used his cleverness in mortar training. After becoming an artilleryman, Li Erxi was very happy. Sure enough, interest is the best teacher, and Li Erxi is always thinking about the accuracy of mortar shooting.
Mortars are actually easy to operate, and in wartime, they are the basic weapons and equipment of infantry, but his shooting accuracy is not very high. It is generally used for fire suppression, not for precision strikes.
But for the Eighth Route Army, which was in difficult conditions at that time, every mortar and every shell was very precious, so it was not just mortars to strike at the momentum and suppress the fire, but to make precision strikes.
Li Erxi, who had just become a mortar, was on his head, and he repeatedly studied how to make the cannon in his hand accurate, and his main training task was also this.
After hard work day and night, Li Erxi also quickly became an excellent gunner, and since then he has also formed a deep relationship with mortars.
In October 1938, the Japanese army's three-month dream of taking China was frustrated, and the Chinese War of Resistance entered a stage of strategic stalemate, and in the face of the protracted situation of the war, the Japanese army focused its attack on the Eighth Route Army and the anti-Japanese base areas. In late October 1939, the Japanese North China Front concentrated heavy troops and began to sweep the Beiyue District of the Jin-Cha-Ji Anti-Japanese Base Area.
One day, Yang Chengwu suddenly received an important piece of intelligence from intelligence personnel: Lieutenant General Norihide Abe, commander of the brigade commander of the independent mixed second brigade of the Japanese army invading China who invaded Zhangjiakou, sent Mura Kenyoshi Daisaku to lead the first brigade of the Japanese army invading China, and more than a thousand puppet troops, to attack Laiyuan County.
The purpose was to open up the line from Zhangjiakou to Laiyuan and set up a stronghold to split the base areas of Pingxi, Chanan, and Yanbei, and stop the activities of the Eighth Route Army, which could deal a fatal blow to the Jin-Cha-Ji Military Region.
Nie Rongzhen
Yang Chengwu, the commander who received the information for the first time, could not help but think that in August 1939, the Jin-Cha-Ji Sub-district cooperated in a beautiful ambush between Shimenyu and Jingzihui in laiyuan and Mingbao areas, which interrupted the enemy's communication line there. At the end of September, the Japanese army began a winter sweep from the southern line of the Jin-Cha-Ji base area, and as a result, more than 800 Japanese troops were completely annihilated by our Eighth Route Army.
According to Yang Chengwu's judgment, the enemy who was burning in anger this time should come to take revenge. Yang Chengwu couldn't help but shiver, and he rode his horse overnight to the Jin-Cha-Ji headquarters at Nie Rongzhen's office in Fuping to report on the situation.
As soon as yang Chengwu entered the door, he began to report the information he had received, and Nie Rongzhen, who had always been cautious, turned on the kerosene lamp on the table, and he walked to the table and looked at a map on the table and asked: "Is the intelligence accurate?" ”
Yang Chengwu said: "There is no problem. Our intelligence is based on a number of sources. ”
So the plan of the two people was: from Laiyuan County to Yinfang all the way, all deep valleys, out of Laiyuan County to Baishikou, to the south is Yansu Cliff, of which there is only one mountain road to walk, and the Japanese army on the east road is the best choice.
In this way, Yang Chengwu led the Jin-Cha-Ji Military Region to lurk in the Yansu Cliff Gorge, and after a day and a night, when the Japanese troops on the East Road reached Baishikou, Yang Chengwu immediately ordered the third detachment of the Jin-Cha-Ji Military Region to retreat and fight while luring the enemy to go deeper.
Therefore, the enemy thought that they were just a small number of troops, trying to eliminate them in one fell swoop, so they chased after them and chased them all the way to Yansu Cliff.
When the enemy entered Yansu Cliff, Yang Chengwu immediately issued an order to the troops for a general attack. Suddenly, shouts of death were everywhere, and the team rushed up to the high ground like a tide, firing fiercely at the enemy. More than five hundred enemy men were ambushed.
Battle of Loess Ridge
The other two enemy forces, after being intercepted and blocked by our army for a day, retreated to the jianjianling stronghold and Laiyuan county seat.
I have to say that the Battle of Yansu Cliff was a beautiful ambush battle. However, the enemy did not give up so easily.
According to Yang Chengwu's previous experience, the enemy will definitely retaliate after defeat. And it is often the defeated soldiers who return home, and their mechanized troops immediately pounce on them.
At this time, the commander of the Japanese army in Jin-Cha-Ji, Abe Norihide, had just been promoted to the rank of lieutenant general, and he was eager to repay the emperor, and he was certainly not willing to leave such an embarrassing defeat in his outstanding achievements.
Sure enough, two days later, Abe Norihide led the invading Japanese army into two brigades of the Second Brigade, about 1,500 people, divided into more than 90 trucks, and was coming along the old road in an attempt to find the main force of the Eighth Route Army and fight to the death.
That night, Abe Norihide crossed the Baishi Pass and traveled to the area of Yansu Cliff, but he did not even see a shadow of the common people and the Eighth Route Army. Then the next day, most of Abe's men traveled to various villages and silver squares, but they still could not find the shadows of the main force of the Eighth Route Army and the common people.
The frivolous and conceited Abe Norihide became angry, and in a fit of rage, he ordered the people to set fire to the houses in the village.
Yang Chengwu watched the flames rising in the distance at the top of the mountain, and he was even more convinced of his initial judgment that the enemy had come to take revenge. And at this time, the enemy was eager for revenge and could not find the fighter, so he was impatient and impulsive, so he made such a move.
The enemy troops, who were led by the guerrillas in a circle in the mountains, were already exhausted, twice pounced on the air, and burned the house with extreme anger, but they could not find anyone. In the end, the troops led by Norihide Abe were led by the nose by the guerrillas and went around the Loess Ridge.
After hanging the enemy for four days, Abe Norihide led his troops into the Position of the Eighth Route Army at Loess Ridge.
Chen Zhengxiang, commander of our army's command regiment, found that on a mountain bag located south of Xiaohegou, several Japanese officers were holding up telescopes to look at our position, and there were Japanese troops coming in and out of a separate courtyard a few dozen meters away from the mountain bag where they were located.
Chen Zhengxiang judged that this independent courtyard should be the command post of the Japanese army, and the mountain bag may be the observation post of the Japanese army.
Oil painting by Li Erxi
So Li Erxi's artillery company, which was on standby at the foot of the mountain, rushed to the battlefield under the call of Chen Zhengxiang. Li Erxi, who was responsible for operating the mortar launch, stared intently at the small courtyard through the mortar's telescope, making calculations and aiming.
Li Erxi once recalled: "I saw that the house on the west side of the courtyard was a little taller and more beautiful, while the house building on the east side of the courtyard was black and smeared." So I judged that the Japanese would definitely be in that house to the west, and I would fight there. ”
Li Erxi fired four precision artillery shells while throwing them at the enemy's command post and observation post. I saw the enemy coming in and out of the panic.
The Battle of Loess Ridge was another unprecedented victory for the Jin-Cha-Ji Dynasty since the Yansu Cliff Ambush, in which the Eighth Route Army annihilated more than 900 enemies, captured five cannons, hundreds of guns, and countless ammunition, as well as more than 200 mules and wagons full of military supplies.
This made Yang Chengwu not expect that it was Li Erxi's four shells that killed Abe Norihide. Because the owner of the house was Chen Hanwen, at that time, Chen Hanwen's family was forced by the Japanese army to a broken house in the east, while the senior Japanese generals were in the west house. At that time, Abe Norihide was sitting on a stool in the doorway of the west side of the room, when he was killed by a flying shell. The Chen Hanwen family, who lived in the house on the east side, was unharmed.
Norihide Abe was the most senior Japanese general eliminated since the Anti-Japanese War in China. Li Erxi was immediately named "Divine Gunner" by the warriors, and he also ushered in the highlight moment of his life.
Commander Nie Rongzhen also came to reward Li Erxi with a pistol, and someone took a photo of Li Erxi afterwards.
Later, Li Erxi went to Shaoguan, Guangdong Province, to suppress bandits under the arrangement of the organization, and after 1952, he worked in the civil affairs system of Shaoguan, and he has always been very low-key.
In 2010, in a special care ward at Yuebei Hospital in Shaoguan City, Guangdong Province, on his deathbed, he wrote with a hand with a hanging needle: "Don't forget the national shame and revitalize China." ”
Although the war has passed, the great righteousness of the revolutionary fighters will always exist.
Resources:
"BTV" archives seventy years of revitalization of China's persistence