As everyone knows, Yang Jingyu was an important founder and leader of the Northeast Anti-Japanese Resistance League, leading the Northeast Anti-Japanese Alliance to run across the northeast land, beating the Japanese puppet army to the ground and becoming a banner of the Northeast War of Resistance.
Many people think that Yang Jingyu is a northeasterner, or a Shandong person, in fact, it is not, Yang Jingyu is actually a Henan person, and his real name is not Yang Jingyu, but Ma Shangde.
So, why did Ma Shangde change his name to Yang Jingyu? He was originally from Henan, so why did he go to the northeast to lead the War of Resistance?
Born in 1905 in Liwan Village, Qishan County, Henan Province, Yang Jingyu joined the Communist Youth League of China in 1926 and was sent by the organization to return to his hometown of Qishan County to carry out the peasant movement.
In 1927, at the age of 22, Yang Jingyu successfully led 60,000 people to participate in the Zhenshan Uprising, beating a brigade of the Beiyang warlord's Eighth Army to the ground, and making Yang Jingyu famous in a battle.
In the autumn of that year, in order to cooperate with the autumn harvest uprising led by Chairman Mao, Yang Jingyu also launched the autumn harvest uprising in Liudian, which was once again successful and established the country's first county-level peasant and workers' revolutionary regime led by the Communist Party, the Provisional Public Security Committee of Qishan County.
Later, according to the instructions of the central authorities, Yang Jingyu also reorganized the rebel contingent into the Henan guerrilla group of the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army and served as the commander-in-chief.
During this time, Yang Jingyu has been thinking about how to preserve the Red regime, and for this reason, he creatively put forward the idea of "finding a place where the situation is very good, and the base of war can be defended" as a revolutionary base area. This idea coincided with Chairman Mao's idea of creating a red base area, and also laid a solid foundation for him to later carry out anti-Japanese guerrilla tactics in the northeast.
Later, the Kuomintang reactionaries frantically suppressed the revolutionary movement, and under the white terror, our Party and our army suffered tremendous losses. The Central Committee realized that it was too important for our Party to cultivate a contingent of competent cadres capable of carrying out their work, and therefore the Central Committee ordered the provincial party committees and working committees to recommend outstanding cadres to Shanghai to participate in training and accumulate strength for the revolution.
Yang Jingyu, as the only cadre recommended by the Henan Provincial Party Committee, reported to Shanghai and was personally received by Zhou Enlai.
At that time, Yang Jingyu was still called Ma Shangde, and in order to avoid the pursuit of the Kuomintang reactionaries, the organization asked him to change his name, and Ma Shangde said:
"My mother's surname is Zhang, and I want to 'consistently' persist in the revolution without wavering, so let's call zhang Guanyi!"
Therefore, during that time, he was all introduced under the name "Zhang Guanyi".
After the training in Shanghai, Zhou Enlai considered Zhang Guanyi to be a rare talent in carrying out the workers' and peasants' revolution, so he personally talked to him and explained the arrangements made by the central authorities for him after the training, either transferring him to the All-China Federation of Trade Unions to lead the workers' movement, or sending him to the Soviet Union to study military affairs and lead the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army after returning to China.
After careful selection, Zhang Guanyi still felt that in order to improve himself, both his cultural level and ability and quality needed to be improved, so he proposed to Zhou Enlai that he wanted to study in the Soviet Union for further study.
Zhou Enlai was very supportive of his choice, so he issued a relevant letter of introduction and asked him to contact the Manchurian Provincial Party Committee in the northeast to handle the matter of going abroad.
After Zhang Guanyi came to the northeast, he quickly connected with the organization, which told him that the relevant procedures for going abroad were being processed, and he still needed to wait for a while. However, Zhang Guanyi was a person who could not stay idle, and he proposed to the organization that he wanted to do some temporary work.
The Manchurian Provincial Party Committee was very enthusiastic about his work, and first sent him to Dalian to engage in trade unions and student movements.
Later, as an inspector, Zhang Guanyi went to fushun coal mine to lead the revolutionary struggle and won a comprehensive victory, the coal miners won a great deal of rights and interests, the treatment was also greatly improved, and secret organizations among the workers were also established.
Because the victory of the struggle in the Fushun coal mine has greatly stimulated the enthusiasm of the labor movement in the northeast region, the Manchurian provincial party committee called this month "Red May".
Many people think that Yang Jingyu is from Shandong, and it was during this period that it was passed down, what is the reason?
Originally, after Zhang Guanyi arrived at the Fushun Coal Mine, he found that most of the miners were from Shandong, and he was from Henan, and his accent was similar to that of southwest Shandong, so in order to get closer to everyone, he simply said that he was from Caozhou, Shandong, and was called "Shandong Zhang" by everyone.
However, while Zhang Guanyi was waiting to go to the Soviet Union, the "Middle East Road Incident" suddenly broke out, and the relations between the northeast and the Soviet Union deteriorated, and Zhang Guanyi's study in the Soviet Union was interrupted.
At this time, Liu Shaoqi had just been appointed secretary of the Manchurian Provincial CPC Committee, and he knew Zhang Guanyi's name very early on; after Zhang Guanyi's study abroad was interrupted, Liu Shaoqi specifically talked to him once, explaining to him the current situation of struggle in the northeast region, and considering the shortage of talents in the northeast, he deliberately let Zhang Guanyi stay and persist in the struggle in the northeast region.
Zhang Guanyi is a very mature Communist Party member, and although he has some regrets about not studying abroad, he still told Liu Shaoqi that he resolutely obeyed the organization's arrangements.
Later, the Manchurian Provincial Party Committee held a meeting of the Standing Committee to discuss Zhang Guanyi's work, and finally unanimously agreed that Zhang Guanyi would stay in the northeast and report to the central authorities for approval.
In this way, Zhang Guanyi stayed in the northeast and began to lead the great cause of the northeast people's war of resistance.
So, how did Zhang Guanyi change his name to Yang Jingyu?
In 1932, Yang Diankun, the political commissar of the Jilin guerrillas, was injured and went to Harbin for treatment, and Zhang Guanyi took over his job as the political commissar of the guerrillas.
Because Yang Diankun's influence in the local area is very large and deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, the organization allowed Zhang Guanyi to work better, so that he temporarily changed his surname to Yang, and was still called "Yang Political Commissar" to the outside world.
Because Jilin borders North Korea, in Korean, "Yang Commissar" sounds very much like "Yang Jingyu", and in Chinese, "Jingyu" has the meaning of "peaceful and peaceful Yunei", so Zhang Guanyi liked this name very much, and since then it has been changed to "Yang Jingyu", a well-known name for women and children.
Later, Yang Jingyu served as the commander and political commissar of the First Army of the Northeast People's Revolutionary Army, the commander-in-chief and political commissar of the First Route Army of the Northeast Anti-Japanese Coalition Army, and other positions, leading the Northeast Anti-Japanese Coalition to gallop in the White Mountains and Black Waters, composing a magnificent anti-War drama.
Unfortunately, due to the betrayal of traitors, Yang Jingyu was surrounded by heavy Japanese troops, and eventually outnumbered, and was martyred on February 23, 1940, at the age of 35.
In early 1946, The county where General Yang Jingyu died was renamed Jingyu County in honor of this great anti-Japanese hero.
In Liwan Village, Qishan County, Henan Province, general Yang Jingyu's hometown, the former residence and memorial hall of Yang Jingyu were also established, which became a national patriotism education demonstration base.
(References: People's Daily, Party Life, Henan Daily, Qilu Evening News)