At 10:00 a.m. on July 27, 1937, General Li Wentian, deputy commander of the 38th Division of the 29th Army of the National Revolutionary Army and acting as the commander of the 38th Division, faced with the aggressive posture of the Japanese army, decided to take advantage of the insufficient strength of the Japanese army and take the initiative to attack, and hit the Japanese army by surprise. Therefore, he summoned the principal military and political leaders in Tianjin to a meeting to study the battle plan, and the participants of this meeting included Li Wentian, deputy commander of the 38th Division and director of the Municipal Police Bureau, Huang Weigang, commander of the 112th Brigade, Li Zhiyuan, commander of the Independent 26th Brigade, Qi Guangyuan, commander of the pistol regiment of the 38th Division, Liu Jialuan, commander of the Tianjin Security Corps, Ning Dianwu, captain of the Tianjin Security Corps, and Ma Yanchong, secretary general of the municipal government.
The meeting decided to launch a surprise attack on the Japanese at 2 a.m. on July 29. After the battle began, the Chinese army simultaneously launched an attack on the Japanese army at Haiguang Temple, the railway station, the East Bureau sub-airport, and the Japanese concession in the urban area. This was the last battle before the fall of Beiping and Tianjin, and it was also the only battle in which our army took the initiative to attack since the Lugou Bridge Incident, so the historians of the War of Resistance called it the "Tianjin Great Attack."
After the battle began, the Independent Twenty-sixth Brigade was the main attacking force, and they fought fiercely. The brigade commander of the Twenty-sixth Brigade was General Li Zhiyuan, and under him, there were two main regiments, two regimental commanders, one was Zhu Chunfang and the other was Ma Furong, both of whom were tiger generals. In particular, Zhu Chunfang's regiment, they were responsible for attacking the Beining Road Main Station, which is now the Tianjin Railway Station North Railway Station, they first bombarded with artillery pre-arranged in Beining Park, after the artillery, the infantry launched an attack, the main station was rebuilt, and then took advantage of the victory to capture the Beining Railway General Bureau occupied by the Japanese army.
At this time, the reconnaissance sent a situation, and a large group of Japanese troops was quickly coming to reinforcements. As soon as the brigade commander, General Li Zhiyuan, heard this, he immediately issued an order saying that there were more than a thousand people in a large brigade of the enemy, and we could not wait for them to set the position open before fighting with them, but we should launch a surprise attack, scatter them, and eventually retreat.
Zhu Chunfang asked, Brigadier General, how to fight. General Lee Chi-won said: Draw a hundred men from your regiment, set up a death squad, kill them in the enemy's ranks, and scatter them first. After Zhu Chunfang received the order, he immediately mobilized a hundred elite generals, and without waiting for the brigade commander to issue an order, he set off with the team. Commander Ma Furong looked at it, this is not okay, how can the credit be robbed by their regiment, he turned his head and mobilized a hundred elite generals, and without waiting for the brigade commander to give orders, he also led the team to set off.
Although they were brave and fierce, there were too few people, and they were about to be surrounded by the Japanese army, and at this moment, a hundred people of Ma Furong's regiment were killed, so the Japanese army was chaotic and retreated one after another. The two regimental commanders killed the red eye at this time, and bit the Japanese army in the back to slash and kill. After Brigadier Li Zhiyun saw it in the telescope, his heart was suddenly shocked, and the old saying said, Poor Komo chase, if the enemy's reinforcements come, not only two hundred people will be finished, but the two regimental commanders will be finished. So he ordered the trumpeter to blow the retreat trumpet, but it was useless, the two regimental commanders killed the red eye, where can still hear the trumpet. As a last resort, Brigadier Lee ordered his guards to chase the two regimental commanders on horseback before calling them back.