History has its own life, it is like a person, both easy-going and self-respecting. ——Yu Qiuyu
The Red Fourth Front is an important revolutionary contingent in the history of our Party, and this unit has two very distinctive characteristics. One is strong combat strength, in Xu Shuai's own words, summed up in five words: fierce, hard, fast, fierce, live. The other is that the cadres are young, and part of the reason is attributed to the repression in the Eyu-Anhui period, and the other is also related to the fighting style of the troops. The Red Fourth Front is known for its bravery, and in the Battle of the Four Fronts, commanders must go down to the front line and charge and kill first, for example, in the battle against the Siege of the Sixth Route, Xu Shiyou, then deputy commander of the Red Ninth Army, personally served as the captain of the death squad, wielding a large knife and rushing to the enemy position in the first place. However, this style of combat makes the cadres suffer particularly many casualties, and they are also exchanged for special diligence. It is not surprising that the cadres are young again and again, such as the youngest division commander in the Red Fourth Front, Xiong Houfa.
Founding General Xu Shiyou practiced martial arts
Speaking of Xiong Houfa, we suddenly think of the 30th Army of the Red Fourth Front, the Red 30th Army is the main force of the Red Fourth Front, and the 88th Division of Xiong Houfa is the main division of the Red 30th Army. The reason why the Eighty-eighth Division has achieved great success is inseparable from the excellent command of their division commander Xiong Houfa. And this heroic division commander is only a young man in his early 20s.
The commander of the Red Eighty-eighth Division, Xiong Houfa
Xiong Houfa was born on March 5, 1914, to a poor peasant family in Ganjiawan, Xuanhuadian Township, Luoshan County, Henan (now part of Dawu County, Hubei). When he was a child, Xiong Houfa was exploited and oppressed by the landlord's old wealth, so when he remembered a little, he had already set a lofty ambition in his heart to overthrow the landlord and liberate the peasants. In 1929, at the age of 15, Xiong Houfa joined the Luoshan Red Guards, fighting the enemy with darts and large knives. In 1930, Xiong Houfa joined the local Red Army and worked as a soldier in the Luoshan County Independent Regiment, during which time he joined the Communist Youth League. In the spring of 1931, Xiong Houfa gloriously joined the Communist Party of China, at which time he served as a platoon leader of the Luoshan Independent Battalion. In May 1932, the Luoshan Independent Battalion was incorporated into the 13th Division of the Red Fourth Army, and Xiong Houfa was appointed as the company commander of the 39th Regiment of the 13th Division and the battalion commander of the 36th Regiment of the 12th Division, when he was eighteen years old.
Manchuan Pass breakout
In October 1932, Xiong Houfa withdrew from the Eyu-Anhui base area with the main force of the Red Fourth Front, transferred to Sichuan and Shaanxi, and successively participated in the liberation of Tongjiang City and Bazhong City, making contributions to the creation of the Sichuan-Shaanxi Revolutionary Base Area.
In July 1933, after the Wooden Gate Conference, the headquarters of the Red Fourth Front decided to expand the four divisions into four corps. Among them, based on the original Red Eleventh Division, the local independent regiment was expanded into the Red Thirty Army, with commander Yu Tianyun and political commissar Li Xiannian under the jurisdiction of the Eighty-eighth, Eighty-ninth, and Ninety-First Divisions. Xiong Houfa was transferred from the Red Twelfth Division to the 263rd Regiment of the Red 88th Division as the regimental commander.
Yu Tianyun, commander of the Red Thirty Army
After that, Xiong Houfa led his troops to participate in the Battle of Yi (Long) South (Department), the Battle of Ying (Shan) Qu (County), and the Battle of Xuan (Han) Da (County). He often used the tactics of night combat and surprise attacks to break through the strong fortifications on which the enemy relied on dangerous defenses in one fell swoop, causing them to collapse in their entirety, and then bravely pursuing and fighting fiercely to win victory.
On October 4, 1933, Liu Xiang, commander-in-chief of the Sichuan "suppression of bandits", gathered about 200,000 large and small warlords and besieged the Sichuan-Shaanxi revolutionary base area in six routes. On December 15, Xiong Houfa led the 263rd Regiment to retreat to Shigu Village under the command of division commander Wang Lieshan. Under the joint command of the two of them, the warriors repelled the enemy's repeated attacks with their spears, stones around them, and only bullets. The battle continued until late afternoon, and the enemy launched a frenzied attack on Shigu Village. Division commander Wang Lieshan was unfortunately shot during the command of the battle and died heroically. After the death of the division commander, Xiong Houfa and his comrades-in-arms were extremely sad and indignant, and this man who had experienced the battlefield could not help but cry bitterly. The comrades shouted the slogan of avenging the division commander, turned grief into strength, resisted the enemy's strong attack 6 times that of themselves, and successfully defended the Position of Shiguzhai.
Wang Lieshan, the first division commander of the Red Eighty-eighth Division
On February 10, 1934, just as the enemy army was still immersed in the rest period of the Spring Festival. Xiong Houfa led the 263rd Regiment to cooperate with the 265th Regiment and the 268th Regiment in attacking the enemy in Ma'anshan at night, and after more than three hours of fierce fighting, annihilated two enemy regiments, and the brigade commander Hao Yueting was killed on the spot.
In early March 1934, Xiong Houfa was promoted to deputy commander of the Red 88th Division, assisting the division commander Cheng Shicai and the 25th Division of the Red Ninth Army to garrison the Wanyuan area and resist Liu Xiang's main force. In mid-April, Liu Xiang attacked the positions of the 268th Regiment and the 263rd Regiment with the strength of four or five regiments. Xiong Houfa led his troops to repel the enemy three times and annihilated more than a thousand enemy personnel. After four or five days of fierce fighting, the enemy first used aircraft artillery to bomb repeatedly, and then launched seven or eight regiments of enemies to attack the Red Army positions in the form of group charges, and the Damian Mountain position instantly turned into a sea of fire, and the air was filled with the smell of burning corpses. Xiong Houfa led his troops to calmly cope with the battle, insisting on waiting for the opportunity, and when the enemy was unable to attack for a long time and his morale was low, Xiong Houfa, together with Cheng Shicai, the commander of the division, commanded the 265th Regiment and the 268th Regiment, and suddenly launched a counter-charge, causing the enemy to lose his armor and collapse into an army at once, retreating seven or eight miles. In this battle, the Red Eighty-eighth Division killed and wounded more than a thousand enemy people, captured more than 700 enemy prisoners, and surrendered more than a thousand guns.
The Red Eighty-eighth Division succeeded Cheng Shicai as division commander
In September 1934, Cheng Shicai was transferred to the deputy commander of the Red 30th Army, and Xiong Houfa succeeded him as the commander of the Red 88th Division, at this time, he was only 20 years old. In the final stage of this anti-six-way siege, in order to completely destroy the fleeing enemy. Under the orders of the headquarters, Xiong Houfa led the Red Eighty-eighth Division to seize Huangmuya with lightning speed, completely cutting off the enemy's retreat. On September 12, the Red 88th Division, with the assistance of the 93rd Division of the Red 31st Army, surrounded and annihilated 2 brigades of Zeng Nanfu and more than 10 regiments of other units under Tian Songyao, annihilating and capturing more than 14,000 enemy prisoners, surrendering more than 7,000 guns and more than 40 mortars. After this battle, Liu Xiang's six-way siege plan was completely bankrupt, and the Red Fourth Front achieved a huge victory in annihilating more than 80,000 enemy troops. At the subsequent summary meeting of the victory of the anti-Six-Road Siege, in view of the tremendous contribution made by the Red Eighty-eighth Division in the anti-encirclement and suppression battle, with the approval of the general headquarters, the 263rd Regiment and the 265th Regiment under the Red 88th Division were specially awarded the "Steel Army" and "Night Tiger" awards.
In March 1935, the Red Fourth Front decided to cross the Jialing River westward to the Chuangan region, and this task fell on Xiong Houfa's shoulders. On March 28, Xiong Houfa led the 263rd Regiment, took wooden boats and bamboo rafts, and covered the landing of the troops with heavy artillery fire. The advance team quickly inserted into the enemy position, annihilated 1 battalion of the enemy, controlled the commanding heights, and successfully completed the task of crossing the river. After that, he led the Red Eighty-eighth Division in conjunction with the Thirty-first Army to attack Jianmen Pass. With the close cooperation of the brother troops, the Red Army fought fiercely for half a day, annihilated the 3 regiments of the defending enemy, and successfully won the sword gate pass of "one husband and one pass, no one can open".
In October 1936, after the Red First, Second, and Fourth Fronts joined the division, the Red 30th Army, the Red Ninth Army, and the Red Fifth Army, a total of 21,800 people, were ordered to cross the Yellow River in the west, carry out the Ningxia Campaign plan, open up international routes, and obtain assistance from the Soviet Union. At this time, Xiong Houfa had been promoted to deputy commander of the Red 30th Army and commander of the 88th Division. Xiong Houfa led the Red Thirty Army, together with the brother troops, to carry out a bitter and fierce bloody battle in the Hexi Corridor against the warlords Ma Bufang and Ma Buqing, who had long occupied the Ganqing area. Although the vast number of commanders and fighters fought bravely and struck hard at the horse bandits, at this time the Western Route Army fell into the unfavorable situation of fighting alone and suffered heavy losses.
On January 23, 1937, the Western Route Army all retreated to the Ni family camp. Li Xiannian, the political commissar of the 30th Army, entrusted the heavy responsibility of defense to Xiong Houfa. Xiong Houfa commanded the Red Eighty-eighth Division to repel multiple enemy attacks by two brigades. Later, the enemy brought in four more brigades of enemies and launched a group charge, and Xiong Houfa commanded the whole division to hold out for another day, and finally had to carry out a breakthrough because it was outnumbered.
Li Xiannian, political commissar of the 30th Red Army
During the breakout, Xiong Houfa was shot in his left arm and bled unceasingly, but he still stubbornly commanded the battle. On March 11, Xiong Houfa followed the main force to Qilian Mountain, but due to the lack of medical treatment, his left arm wounds continued to deteriorate, and he could no longer walk with the troops. In order not to increase the burden on the troops, he asked the military political commissar Li Xiannian to stay in the local area to fight guerrillas, and Li Xiannian was unwilling to leave Xiong Houfa behind, but under Xiong Houfa's repeated insistence, he could only agree to his request. Later, he led nearly a hundred warriors to encounter the enemy in solsung, and in the fierce battle with the enemy, Xiong Houfa and his comrades were outnumbered, and all of them died heroically. Xiong Houfa was only 23 years old when he died.
When Chairman Li Xiannian was dying, he recalled his sacrificed comrade-in-arms Xiong Houfa, and he said: "Xiong Houfa, what a good comrade, commanding the fighter plane is flexible, heroic and tenacious, and he was only 23 years old when he died."