Tong Guirong, Liu Zhidan's wife.
On April 14, 1936, Liu Zhidan was killed in an attack on sanjiao town in Zhongyang County, Shanxi, at the age of 33. At that time, Tong Guirong was suffering from a very serious typhoid fever and was living in the hospital, when he heard the bad news, he immediately fainted. After waking up, at her request, the people carried her to an orchard in the south of the city, where there were pear blossoms, and she sat up from the stretcher and looked in the direction of her husband's sacrifice, and was silent for a long time.
Ten days later, Comrade Liu Zhidan's memorial meeting was held in Wayao Fort, and seeing that Tong Guirong was devastated, the organization did not let her participate in the memorial meeting, and even more could not bear to let her see Liu Zhidan's body. It was not until Liu Zhidan's body was buried outside the south gate of Wayao Fort that someone sent her over.
In the years of the revolutionary war, a good man, if he didn't say it, would be gone. Watching her husband's coffin buried little by little, Tong Guirong suddenly got up and pounced on the coffin, wanting to go with her husband. Those present pulled her aside and could not help but shed tears for the hero's departure and for her again.
Subsequently, Tong Guirong finally cried out, the kind that tore his heart and lungs apart: "I have two sons, one was starved to death to escape the warlord's raids, and the other was killed by the medicine given by the captured Kuomintang military doctor, and now Zhidan is also sacrificed and gone... How will I live in the future! ”
The cry startled the pear blossom of the tree in the orchard where she had stayed earlier. The pear blossoms are white, beautiful to others, but to Tong Guirong, they are like frost and snow. In this way, in that spring, a tree of pear blossoms on the land of northern Shaanxi was angry in the life of Tong Guirong, and became the strength, flexibility, kindness and tolerance of women in the yellow land.
Tong Guirong, daughter of the Tong clan of Jiuzuipo in Loufangping Township, Wuqi County. His father's name was Tong Bingxiong, a hard-working and simple farmer, and his grandfather's name was Tong Xirui, and Liu Zhidan's grandfather Liu Shijie was a good friend. The Liu family is a local noble family, once, Liu Shijie went to see Tong Xirui, saw a group of female dolls in the courtyard playing, very happy, but also made Tong Xirui feel very happy. Liu Shijie couldn't help but say: "You have so many granddaughters, can you give one of your granddaughters-in-law to be my granddaughter-in-law?" Tong Xirui smiled happily, called three of them, and asked them to stand in a row, picked by Liu Shijie. Originally, Liu Shijie said it casually, but doing so with Xi Rui made him pay great attention to it.
Three female dolls stood brushed together, one slightly taller than the other, they did not know what it meant to marry, but they just thought it was fun for Grandpa to let them "take sides". Liu Shijie took a look at the female dolls and felt that the youngest one was very clever and well-bodied, so he asked her what her name was. The baby girl said, "Sanxiuzi! Liu Shijie asked the genus again. The baby girl said, "Snake, long worm!" Liu Shijie smiled: "My grandson belongs to the rabbit, if you want to be rich, snake pan rabbit!" Then he and his old friend Xi Rui booked a doll kiss for Liu Zhidan.
In 1918, Liu Zhidan was 15 years old, and at that time, the young men in the countryside should find a partner at this age. Liu Shijie thought of Sanxiuzi and arranged for Liu Zhidan to visit his father-in-law and mother-in-law. Liu Shijie said to Tong Bingxiong and his wife: "I was betrothed to the baby with sanxiuzi and his grandfather, and now that my baby is older, I will bring him over for you to see. "Tong Bingxiong and his wife saw that Liu Zhidan was born with a clear eyebrow, he wanted to have a head, he wanted to have a figure, and he was also very polite, and he talked elegantly, so he was happy in his heart, and he decided that what Tong Xirui had done was a good thing, and he agreed to it, and he also intended to let San xiuzi take a look in front of Liu Zhidan.
At this time, although Sanxiuzi was only 13 years old, she already understood the meaning of marrying someone to marry, and like her parents, she liked Liu Zhidan from the bottom of her heart, and Liu Zhidan also fell in love with her at first sight. Three years later, in May 1921, under the management of the two families, Liu Zhidan and Sanxiuzi held a wedding. After marriage, the two fell in love with each other, people still called Sanxiuzi's milk name, Liu Zhidan felt that this was not good, so he said to Sanxiuzi: "You are all adults, you have to have a big name, your surname is the same, the last word of my name is Gui (Liu Zhidan's name is Jinggui, Zidan, Zhidan is his word), you are called Tong Guirong!" Let the two of us live together, struggle together, and share the same glory, what do you think? ”
Sanxiuzi had no culture, did not quite understand what Liu Zhidan meant, and asked Liu Zhidan: "I don't understand, what you say is what you say." Liu Zhidan said, "Then from now on, your name will be Tong Guirong!" Tong Guirong thought for a while and said, "I haven't been to school, you won't dislike me, will you?" Liu Zhidan said: "Where the words, as long as you are willing to learn, I will teach you!" In this way, Tong Guirong began by learning to write the 5 characters of Liu Jinggui and Tong Guirong's names, and while living with Liu Zhidan, he followed Liu Zhidan to recognize words and learn culture.
Glory is bought with suffering and even sacrifice. Tong Guirong may not have been very clear about the truth in the middle at that time, or he did not think of how "glorious" it was to follow Liu Zhidan, in her heart, there was only the death reason of women in the yellow land after marrying: who entered the door of the family, whose family. Thus having a happy life of breathing and suffering with Liu Zhidan, he became a good assistant to Liu Zhidan.
Liu Zhidan was admitted to Yulin Middle School in Lianhe County, Northern Shaanxi in 1921, during which time he served as the president of the student union, organizing and leading the student movement and fighting against the warlord Jing Yuexiu and other feudal forces. In the winter of 1924, he joined the Chinese Socialist Youth League, in 1925 he joined the Communist Party of China, and in the autumn of the same year, he was ordered to be admitted to the Whampoa Military Academy. During the Era of the Great Revolution, he served as the political director of the Fourth Route Army of the National Revolutionary Army and actively participated in the war against the Beiyang warlords. After the defeat of the Great Revolution in 1927, he traveled to Hubei, Anhui, Shaanxi and other provinces to organize uprisings... During this period in 1923, Liu Zhidan and Tong Guirong's first child was born, a boy, and the whole family was very happy for the new fourth generation. But a few months later, the child died prematurely. In this process, although Tong Guirong called Liu Zhidan a "man who forgot to have a family", he fully supported everything Liu Zhidan did.
In 1928, the Weihua Uprising failed, and Liu Zhidan returned home with scabies on his body. Tong Guirong went up to the mountain to collect medicine, and then boiled the medicine into a soup, scrubbing Liu Zhidan every day, and in less than a month, the scabies on Liu Zhidan's body were all healed. The following year, they had a daughter, Liu Lizhen. Like most women in the Yellow Land, Tong Guirong felt that he had only given birth to a girl and failed to give birth to a son for Liu Zhidan. In this regard, Liu Zhidan said: "Girls are good, girls are the same as the meat of our hearts!" Then the revolution began, and in 1931, the Northwest Anti-Imperialist Allied Army was organized, which was later changed to the Shaanxi-Gansu Guerrilla Detachment of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, and truly became a man who did not live at home.
In February 1934, Liu Zhidan led the team to a short stay at Liu Jialang, which was only a few miles away from home, but because of the importance of military affairs, he could not go home to meet with Tong Guirong. After Tong Guirong got the news, he carried his daughter on his back and trotted all the way to Liu Jiazhen, and finally met his husband. At this time, Liu Lizhen was 5 years old, Liu Zhidan took her in his arms and kissed her, and then told Tong Guirong that the Red Army is now stronger, the enemy is very afraid, at any time the dog will jump the wall and pounce on the red army's family, "You go back and tell your father, you must take precautions, you can't fall into the hands of the enemy." Tong Guirong was a little frightened, and hurriedly returned with his children, and it was not long before Tan Shilin, the leader of the Qingyang warlords, sent bandits to raid the Liu family.
Tong Guirong, because he had received a letter from the villagers in advance, fled into the mountains with Liu Zhidan's relatives. The enemy became angry and frantically burned the Liu family's house, dug up the Liu family's ancestral grave, and killed two relatives of the Liu family who did not come and fled. At first, the Liu family hid in a bunker, but the target of more than a dozen people was too large and easy to be found, so they had to hide separately. Tong Guirong took Liu Lizhen over the mountains and hid in a cave, and the only things that kept them alive were a few mouthfuls of fried noodles and mountain spring water outside the cave.
Liu Lizhen later recalled this time: "My mother and I hid in the landscape cave of Daqugou and did not see the light of day for eight days and eight nights. When I was hungry, my mother fed me a little fried batter, and I didn't see any grain for eight days and eight nights, so I could only drink some water. My mother was a young woman in her 20s at that time, and with me, who was still nursing, I was shocked and scared in the mountains, and I didn't know when I was going to hide..."
Even so, the enemy left, and Tong Guirong's brother-in-law had a hard time finding him up the mountain and taking Guirong back, but Tong Guirong still refused, afraid that because he was involved with the Liu family, he finally reluctantly hid in the brother-in-law's grass kiln under the strong persuasion of his brother-in-law. In April 1934, the organization heard the news and sent someone to bring Liu Zhidan's father Liu Peiji and Tong Guirong's mother and daughter to Nanliang. Since then, Tong Guirong and his daughter Liu Lizhen have participated in the revolution and became one of the first three female revolutionaries in the Southern Liang base area.
When the family was reunited, Liu Zhidan was very happy and said to Tong Guirong: "I have long wanted to take you over to do the revolution together, and now it is good, we are together, and we don't have to worry about each other in the future!" Tong Guirong was initially assigned to the "Red Army Laundry Station", and later, he was transferred to the "Red Army Quilt Factory" to make quilts and shoes for the troops. In order to ensure that the soldiers in the front can have clothes to wear, this simple northern Shaanxi woman is all focused on work, treating her husband's comrades as her relatives, many people's clothes are torn and dirty, she takes the initiative to sew and wash, and loves the soldiers better than her daughters. Before long, everyone regarded her as a family member and relative, and affectionately called her "Sister-in-law Liu", so that they forgot her name - Tong Guirong.
In the early spring of 1935, Tong Guirong and Liu Zhidan had a third child, a boy, and after his birth, Liu Zhidan hurriedly gave him a name and went to the front. In September of the same year, Xu Haidong led the Red Twenty-fifth Army to the Shaanxi-Gansu Border Region, and merged with the Red Twenty-sixth Army and the Twenty-seventh Army led by Liu Zhidan to form the Red Fifteenth Army, with Xu Haidong as the commander of the army and Liu Zhidan as the deputy commander and chief of staff. In order to prevent the Central Red Army during the Long March from entering the Shaanxi-Gansu revolutionary base area, the enemy frantically encircled and suppressed the base area, and the Red Fifteenth Army was frequently involved in wars, and Liu Zhidan had no time to take care of family affairs. One day, the two children suddenly started a fever, and Tong Guirong was very anxious and helpless, so he asked a captive Kuomintang military doctor to give his son an injection and give his daughter a pill. She believes that the doctor is the one who treats the sick and saves people, and the result is that her son, who is not yet one year old, died in the afternoon of the same day, and her daughter's condition is more serious. Tong Guirong went to the captive Kuomintang military doctor with his son, who was no longer breathing, but the Kuomintang military doctor disappeared after giving the child medicine and fled. Tong Guirong was grief-stricken, thinking how there were still such bad people under the heavens, but fortunately, his daughter Liu Lizhen had a big life and finally survived.
This was the military subordinate of the Red Army, facing the departure of the child, Tong Guirong did not know where her husband was, even if he could appear in front of her and give her a little comfort! The yellow land remained silent, but Tong Guirong was torn apart at that moment. Apparently, at that moment, she did not know that her life would usher in a greater storm - she was tormented in fear, eager for her husband to come home to see, but the news she waited for was that her husband had been arrested together - in October, Liu Zhidan was imprisoned in the prison of Wayao Fort during the wrong "purge" in northern Shaanxi, and all the cadres above the original twenty-six military camps were arrested.
In the midst of suffering, people need to have a relative around them to speak, even if it is an ignorant child. Tong Guirong said to his daughter Liu Lizhen: "Go, let's go find your father!" Although her daughter did not understand the meaning of her words, she said it anyway. Subsequently, she carried her daughter on her back and walked from Yongping to Wayao Fort to visit her wronged husband. Who knows, not only did she not look at Liu Zhidan, but she and her daughter were also arrested and incorporated into the "labor reform team.".
Today, many old comrades have written memoirs about this period of history, and Liu Zhidan and others have almost been buried alive. According to the recollections of some veteran comrades, even the pits for burying people alive were dug at that time, but fortunately, the Long March of the Central Red Army reached northern Shaanxi, and the "repression" was immediately corrected; Premier Zhou personally went to the prison to open the shackles for Liu Zhidan, and Chairman Mao cordially received Liu Zhidan, who was released, at Wayao Fort. For this reason, some old comrades who were locked up like Liu Zhidan said with emotion: "Fortunately, the Central Red Army has arrived, and if the Central Red Army comes a few days late, we will become dead!" ”
Scarred, when they met again, Liu Zhidan and Tong Guirong's body and mind were scars from the inside out. After a cry, Liu Lizhen's memories are like this - standing on the ground dazed and overwhelmed, she was summoned by her mother like this: "Zhen Baby, kiss your father quickly!" She felt that the person in front of her was very strange, and "it took a long time to dare to approach him." In Liu Lizhen's memory, she and her parents were lucky to survive the cruel "purge", and a few years later, she still remembers the terrible atmosphere: the "prisoners" wearing cloth covers on their heads, the caves where people were closed, and the pits where people were buried... While taking care of Liu Zhidan's injuries, Tong Guirong washed all of Liu Zhidan's clothes, and she did not know on what day Liu Zhidan would go to the front.
In April 1936, Liu Zhidan led the Red Army on the Eastern Crusade, and before setting out, he said to Tong Guirong: "You must raise your children well, let her study well in the future, and grow up to be a useful person." Tomorrow morning, you will bring Li Zhen to send me! But the next day, when Tong Guirong arrived with her daughter because of the visit of an old comrade, Liu Zhidan had already set off, and this became the final farewell between her and Liu Zhidan and her husband and wife, and it became a farewell.
After Liu Zhidan's body was transported back to Wayao Fort and buried with that cry, Tong Guirong still strongly walked out of the grief of losing her husband. Asked by the organization what she wanted to do in the future, she said: "I am raising my child now, so that my child will inherit his (Liu Zhidan's) legacy in the future." He added, "I, though uncultured, can continue to do something for the revolution." ”
This is Tong Guirong, the wife of a Red Army cadre during the Yan'an period, a hard-working, simple, kind and strong woman in northern Shaanxi. While being a wife, she tried her best to warm the revolutionaries who were like her husbands, and also warmed the vast yellow land. After the Red Army's Long March arrived in northern Shaanxi, she was 5 years older than He Zizhen and was as close as a sister to He Zizhen and had the same affection. She likes to listen to He Zizhen tell the story of the Long March; He Zizhen also likes the "Shaanxi Northern Pass" to tell her about local customs and common sense of life. When she was busy, He Zizhen helped her take care of her daughter. She also gave the clothes made for her husband to the Red Army, who needed clothes more than her husband, and said to her husband: "You are young, and you jump a few times in the cold, unlike them who are still dolls and can't stand the cold!" In this regard, the husband always said to the warriors: "Your sister-in-law treats your little brother preferentially with new clothes, and always favors your little brother!" Whenever the leaders of the Red Army held a meeting, she would make her own "handy rice" to chop soba noodles to entertain everyone. Comrades said happily: "Sister-in-law Liu has improved our food again!" Usually, she always carries a sewing kit on her body, and she takes time to sew clothes for the commanders and fighters who cross the mountains and cut through thorns.
In He Zizhen's memory, there is also such a passage: Once, Tong Guirong asked her: "It is so cold in winter in northern Shaanxi, why does Chairman Mao still wear a single shoe?" At that time, the cotton clothes of the Soldiers of the Red Army were very insufficient, let alone cotton shoes, and even Mao Zedong did not wear cotton shoes. He Zizhen was embarrassed to say it directly, so he told Tong Guirong: "The chairman froze his feet during the Long March, and when it was cold, he swollen and hurt, and a pair of cotton shoes were too tight to wear." After listening to It, Tong Guirong asked He Zizhen for the chairman's shoe sample, went to the street to buy back the shoe material, and used three days and three nights to make a pair of large and soft cotton shoes for the chairman. The chairman put on the right size and was very happy to praise Gui Rong's ingenuity. At the end of the year, the chairman worked one night, his feet were too close to the charcoal fire, and he did not pay attention to baking a hole in his shoes. After learning about it, Tong Guirong made a pair for the chairman, and then made a pair for several other leaders.
In the winter of 1936, Li Min was born, but as early as July, with Gui Rong sewn up the baby quilt, small clothes, etc., He Zizhen saw it and said happily: "With Liu Sister-in-law here, I am at ease!" She also delivered He Zizhen with her own hands, welcoming the birth of the beautiful little girl named "Jiao Jiao" (Li Min's nickname). Because, later, Li Min went to the Soviet Union, and they never met for more than 40 years. But one year in Shanghai, Li Min, who was already middle-aged, recognized her as soon as they met her and called her "Mother Liu".
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After Liu Zhidan's sacrifice, Liu Lizhen became the "big star" of Yan'an. Snow, the author of "Journey to the West" and a famous American journalist, has met Liu Lizhen, and Snow said that Liu Lizhen is a beautiful six-year-old girl, and the Red Army has specially made a military uniform for Liu Lizhen, Liu Lizhen wears an officer's belt, wears a five-star on his hat, and everyone likes Liu Lizhen. Tong Guirong, while raising her daughters with hard work, always cares for and cares for the children of the sisters, no matter which sister has no milk or lacks milk after childbirth, she rushes to find a nursing mother for the baby or finds goat milk, rice soup and other dairy products; which comrade wants to foster the child, she carefully chooses a local reliable peasant family for them. In this regard, the sisters said gratefully: "Thanks to Sister-in-law Liu!" And she just said, "I like kids." They are all descendants of the revolution! ”
After the liberation of the whole country, Tong Guirong has been engaged in early childhood education for a long time and has paid attention to the cause of early childhood education. On May 4, 1999, Tong Guirong died of illness in Xi'an at the age of 94. At this time, the children who have been taken care of by her have been distributed in different places and posts in the motherland, and many of them have grown into high- and middle-level leading cadres, and they still can't help but want to call "Mother Liu" a few more times. At this time, history seems to have deliberately replayed liu zhidan's sacrifice, and she did not participate in the memorial meeting, still sitting in the pear garden in the south of the city, and the pear blossom of the tree is the blossom of life, blooming into fragrant snow and hot snow!
The pictures in this article are from the Internet, referring to Gu Lingyun's "Yellow Flowers on the Battlefield: Red Women in Longdong" (Party History Publishing House, 2013), "The Story of Liu Zhidan" (Social Publishing House, 2006), "Liu Lizhen, daughter of General Liu Zhidan, the main founder of the Red Army in Northern Shaanxi, died of illness" (Southern Metropolis Daily, July 9, 2014) and other historical materials, thanks to the original author!
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