"Amnesty 1959" TV series has a national army war criminal, named Cai Shouyuan, there is no such person in real history, the TV series needs a virtual character name for the plot. This person has a unique skill, whenever he encounters a major event in life that he can't choose, he will take out a compass to calculate for himself, and sometimes he can really blind the cat meet the dead rat and calculate it for him.
However, in recent history, there is really a national army general with the same hobbies as him, named Zhang Gan (gan), because he also likes to play with the compass, so at that time, Bai Chongxi gave him a nickname called "compass" general.
Zhang Gan, born in 1897, a native of Guilin, Guangxi, graduated from the Guangxi Army Accelerated School, when he first joined the army, he served as an aide-de-camp in Lu Rongting's army. The former viceroy of Guangxi during the Qing Dynasty was also the founder of the "Old Gui" warlords.
Later, Li Zongren, Bai Chongxi and others jointly defeated the old Gui warlords, and after the defeat of Zhang Gan's army, the troops were absorbed by Li Zongren, and in 1925, the "New Gui" warlord force was established. Later, it was reorganized by the Nationalist government, and since then there has been no new Gui clan in history, and a strong army has emerged, the Seventh Army of the Nationalist Army, and Li Zongren has served as the first commander.
As we all know, during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, we must say which place the people are the most capable of fighting and the strongest, among whom guangxi people are indispensable. According to the post-war statistics of the National Government, the total population of Guangxi during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression was only about 12 million, while the number of people who participated in the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression in 8 years was as high as 4.5 million, accounting for 40% of the province's population. And the proportion of war casualties is also the lowest, the reason why Guangxi people are so able to fight, on the one hand, is related to the geographical environment of Guangxi, as we all know, Guangxi has few mountains, and "poor mountains and bad waters" describes places like Guangxi.
Moreover, the nationalist army in Guangxi is basically a native of Guangxi, they are very familiar with the terrain of Guangxi, good at mountain combat, and famous for night combat and close combat, the combat effectiveness is quite strong throughout the country, the tactics are very flexible, so the Japanese army suffered a lot of losses when invading Guangxi, and the Seventh Army of the Nationalist Army was also famous in the world.
Li Zongren above
Zhang Gan was a native of Guangxi, during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, this was a sign of his honor, after he followed Li Zongren, because everyone was a fellow countryman, Li Zongren took good care of him, promoted him all the way, and promoted him from battalion commander, lieutenant colonel aide-de-camp, chief of staff, until 1938, when he was promoted to commander of the Seventh Army.
The Seventh Army is quite strong in combat, known as the "Wolf Army", during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the Seventh Army's combat effectiveness in Guangxi was quite strong, and later it was transferred to the Battle of Songhu, cross-regional combat is also strong in combat, although the Seventh Army suffered as many as 2/3 casualties in this battle, but also severely damaged the Japanese army. Subsequently, Zhang Gan led the Seventh Army, traveled to various places and successively participated in the Battle of Wuhan, and fought many vicious battles with the Japanese army in wars such as the Battle of Zao.
Pictured above by Bai Chongxi
After the war, he was praised by Bai Chongxi and Li Zongren, and Bai Chongxi also praised him, and the only two who could fight the most in the nationalist army were Zhang Gan and Hu Chain, which also showed the importance that Li and Bai attached to Zhang Gan.
After the victory of the War of Resistance, he turned his gun on the People's Liberation Army, but during this period he did not have much success, and the only time in the Battle of Huaihai, when all the ace armies were defeated, he fought a small victory on the edge of a battle. In 1948, he was appointed commander of the Third Corps and participated in the Defense of the Yangtze River, but on December 1, 1949, he was captured by the People's Liberation Army in Bobai, Guangxi, and it is said that when he was captured, he was still divining and counting and asking for good fortune.
After his arrest, he was arranged to be transferred to Gongdelin Prison for reform, but due to the long years of conquest, he left many injuries and illnesses on his body, coupled with his great belief in feudal superstitions, the ideological burden was relatively heavy, and he was also older, and died of illness in prison reform in 1959 at the age of 62. It just so happened that this year, China pardoned the first batch of prisoners of war, including Du Yuming, Wang Yaowu and others, but unfortunately he could not wait.