There was a brave and good red army division commander who died heroically in a key battle during the Long March, and his name was Wang Youjun.
Wang Youjun was born in 1911 in Guangji County, Hubei Province (present-day Wuxue City, huanggang City).
In 1930, at the age of 19, Wang Youjun joined the Red Army and served as a soldier in the Red 15th Army, of which Cai Shenxi was the commander. Cai Shenxi was a first-term student of the Whampoa Military Academy, unfortunately died in 1932, and was later recognized by the Central Military Commission as one of the 36 military experts of our army.
In January 1931, the Red 15th Army and the Red 1st Army were merged into the Red 4th Army, with Kuang Jixun as the commander, Yu Dushan as the political commissar, and Xu Xiangqian as the chief of staff. Wang Youjun served as a squad leader in the Red 4th Army and in November became the captain of the special task force of the 10th Division of the Red 4th Army.
At that time, the commander of the 10th Division of the Red 4th Army was the later founding general Wang Hongkun. Wang Hongkun admired Wang Youjun very much and entrusted him with heavy responsibilities many times.
In October 1932, when the main force of the Red 4th Front withdrew from the Eyu-Anhui Soviet Area and moved westward, Wang Youjun led the special task force to serve as a vanguard and made many military achievements. At the beginning of 1933, Wang Youjun was promoted to battalion commander of the 1st Battalion of the 218th Regiment of the Red 73rd Division. At that time, the commander of the Red 73rd Division was Wang Hongkun's cousin and later the founding general Wang Shusheng.
In July 1933, the Red 4th Front was expanded, and the Red 73rd Division was expanded into the Red 31st Army, Wang Shusheng was the first commander of the Red 31st Army, and Wang Youjun was the commander of the 271st Regiment of the 91st Division of the Red 31st Army. Nie Fengzhi, the later founding lieutenant general, was at this time the deputy commander of the 271st Regiment and Wang Youjun's right-hand man.
Wang Youjun, who is good at night combat, can always surprise the enemy and win by surprise when fighting, and has become a famous "night general" in the whole army.
In August 1934, Wang Youjun was promoted to deputy commander of the 91st Division and participated in the anti-3rd and anti-6th road sieges in the Sichuan-Shaanxi base area. In a battle against the 6-way siege, Wang Youjun, as the deputy commander of the division, led 30 pistol team members to cross the Xiaotong River at night, climb over the cliff to touch the enemy's regimental headquarters, kill the enemy regimental commander, destroy the enemy regimental headquarters, and return safely with captured weapons, documents and prisoners.
For this reason, Wang Youjun was praised by the headquarters of the Red 4 Front. The fact that senior generals themselves have done this cannot but be admired, and only our army has such a heroism.
In June 1935, Wang Youjun was transferred back to the Red 4th Army and served as the commander of the Red 10th Division. At this time, the commander of the Red 4 Army was Wang Hongkun, the old chief of Wang Youjun, and the political commissar was the later founding general Zhou Chunquan.
In July 1935, after the Red 4th Front and the Red 1st Front met, the two armies exchanged some cadres, and the chief officer of the Red 4th Army was also adjusted to: the commander was Xu Shiyou, the political commissar was Wang Jian'an, and the chief of staff was Zhang Zongxun.
The commander of the 10th Division of the Red 4th Army was still Wang Youjun, and the deputy commander of the division was wang Jinshan, who was famous and famous.
After that, the Red 4th Army, together with the 30th Army, which also belonged to the Red 4th Front, and the Right Route Army, the Central Red Army led by Chairman Mao, acted together.
In late August 1935, the Red Army's Right Route Army crossed the Songpan Grassland with difficulty and continued its march north into Gannan.
Located in the northwest direction of the Songpan Grassland, the baoza is stuck on the necessary road from northern Sichuan to Gannan.
Baozuo belonged to Ruoerge County, Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan, and the terrain was dangerous, and the southern part of the Kuomintang army Huzong, which knew the red army's destination, immediately organized troops to build bunkers using the Mountain Pass Road to block the Red Army.
If the Red Army could not take the seat, it could only be forced to retreat to the Songpan steppe and once again fall under heavy siege by the enemy army.
Xu Xiangqian, the former enemy commander-in-chief of the Right Route Army, requested that the Red 4th Front take on the task of this battle, and Chairman Mao agreed.
The Red 4th Front was fought by the Red 30th Army and the Red 4th Army.
On the afternoon of August 29, 1935, fighting began. The commander Cheng Shicai and political commissar Li Xiannian led the Red 30th Army to attack the Dajing Temple, which was defended by the enemy in the south of Baozuo, and had to deal with the reinforcements sent by Hu Zongnan, the 49th Division, the main force of the Kuomintang Central Army, with Wu Chengren as the division commander, and the battle was very hard.
The Red Army tried their best in this battle, and at the last moment, the cooks and breeders also threw themselves into the fight, and Cheng Shicai and Li Xiannian reached the forefront. In the end, the Red 30th Army successfully defeated the 49th Division of the Kuomintang Army and successfully took the Great Ring Temple.
While the Red 30th Army ambushed the enemy 49th Division, the Red Fourth Army led by Xu Shiyou, commander of the Red 4th Army, also launched a battle to attack Qiuji Temple north of Baoza.
Defending here was the first regiment of Hu Zongnan's supplementary 1st Brigade. The regimental commander Kang Zhuang was brave and inflicted heavy casualties on the Red 4th Army.
This Kangzhuang actually personally led the death squad to launch a counterattack while the Red Army was breathing.
At this critical moment, Wang Youjun, commander of the Red 10th Division, snatched a machine gun from a soldier and rushed to the battlefield, and the soldiers also launched a charge. When the enemy showed signs of retreat, Wang Youjun pulled out the cold and cold knife from behind him and roared: "Traffic team, follow me!" ”
The traffic team was a trump card of Wang Youjun's division commander, and the officers and men were all equipped with barge guns and a sharp knife. There was a squad leader in the traffic team named Li Desheng, who was a founding major general in 1955, a general in 1988, and a former member of the Politburo Standing Committee of the Central Committee, who participated in this battle and witnessed the sacrifice of Wang Youjun's division commander - just when Wang Youjun's division commander was killing the enemy with a knife, a bullet hit him in the head, and he died heroically, at the age of 24.
The Red 4th Army won a tough victory.
The Reds eventually won the seat.
Xu Shiyou, commander of the Red 4th Army, knelt in front of Wang Youjun's body, looked up at the sky and sighed, and the tears flowed unceasingly.
A staff officer came to ask for instructions on how to deal with the captured materials. Xu Shiyou yelled, "Roll! How many things can not be exchanged for a division commander! ”
Wang Youjun didn't even leave a picture.
The Battle of Baozuo was the first major victory achieved by the Red 1st Front and the Red 4th Front after meeting the division, killing and wounding more than 4,000 enemy division commanders and capturing more than 800 enemy soldiers. At the same time, a large amount of ammunition and materials were captured, and morale was greatly boosted. After listening to Xu Xiangqian's report, Chairman Mao said: The cadres and fighters of the Four Fronts Army are brave and good at fighting and fighting well! At the same time, he deeply regretted Wang Youjun's sacrifice.
The Red Army thus cleared the obstacles to the north and opened the door to march to Gannan, which completely bankrupted the Kuomintang army's plot to trap the Red Army in the meadows.
Who knows, Zhang Guotao has a moth again.
On October 5, Zhang Guotao ordered the former Red 4th Front troops in the Right Route Army to leave the army and go south, and the Red 4th Army and the Red 30th Army had to turn around and go south to meet Zhang Guotao, thus having a history of crossing the meadow three times. The Central Red Army in the Right Route Army thus went north to Gannan. (Liu Jixing)