On the fifteenth day of the seventh lunar month in the fourteenth year of Guangxu (1888), Du Wenqing of Gaoqiao Town, Pudong, Shanghai, stood outside his house, and his wife was giving birth in the house, sweating profusely in pain. After a while, with a loud cry, Du Wenqing's heart also fell to the ground, and his wife Zhu Shi gave birth to a baby boy. Du Wenqing was in a good mood, and he saw that it was the Middle Yuan Festival of Qiu Chengyuelang, so he named his son "Yuesheng".
However, Du Yuesheng's life was not very good, and when he was 4 years old, his parents died one after another, and he had to live with his grandmother and uncle. However, in order to avoid conflicts with his uncle, Du Yuesheng had to wander the streets all day, often going in and out of casinos and other places to get acquainted with people of the three religions and nine streams. At the age of 13, Du Yuesheng gambled for the first time, but he did not want to win. In addition to the excitement, Du Yuesheng did not choose to save the money, but invited several of his friends to a meal, and from that time on, he knew how to buy people's hearts.
When he arrived in Shanghai, Du Yuesheng transformed into Du Yuesheng, and he wanted to point his sword at the beach and break out of the sky in Shanghai. Soon after, Du Yuesheng entered the Huang Mansion through Chen Shichang, the leader of the Qing Gang, and although he was a miscellaneous person at that time, he could "see the six ways and listen to the eight directions", and soon won the favor of the Huang Mansion up and down, and was appreciated by Jin Rong. In addition, Jin Rong's wife Lin Guisheng also attaches great importance to him and often entrusts him to help with some personal affairs.
Once, Du Yuesheng helped Lin Guisheng gamble money and won more than 2400 yuan, Lin Guisheng was very happy, so he gave all the money to Du Yuesheng and let him dispose of it at will. As a result, Du Yuesheng not only doubled the money he owed in the past, but also honored Chen Shichang and other elders, and distributed it to his brothers. Lin Guisheng looked at it and suddenly felt that Du Yuesheng was a person who did big things, and if he went to eat, drink and gamble, then he was a small at best; if he saved money to buy a house, he was not the material for this line of work; however, Du Yuesheng took money and made friends, which is not something that ordinary people can think of.
Later, Du Yuesheng did indeed become a big gangster in Shanghai, and he not only monopolized the two major markets of Shanghai tobacco and gambling, but even surpassed Jin Rong. As the business became bigger and bigger, Du Yuesheng also had to set up another sect to escort his career. Therefore, Du Yuesheng established a new social group, Hengshe. The composition of hengshe is very complicated, except for Du Yuesheng's early disciples of the Green Gang, the rest are elites from all walks of life, such as the second generation of the rich, the political circles, the press and other people from all walks of life, the origin is very simple.
On July 7, 1937, Japan launched a war, Shanghai fell, Du Yuesheng saw that the situation was not good, and quickly fled to Hong Kong. However, at that time, Hong Kong was a British colony, Du Yuesheng was not familiar with the land, although he could spend thousands of dollars to build his own power, but he was already a strong foreign cadre, and he did not have much money on him, which could be described as extremely poor. In 1941, when Hong Kong fell, Du Yuesheng fled to Chongqing, where he gained temporary stability, but his gambling problems remained unchanged.
Once, Du Yuesheng had no money when he gambled, so he looked for someone to borrow money everywhere. After Liu Hangchen learned about it, he immediately sent a blank check from Chuankang Bank for him to fill in, and said to him: "Mr. Du, the cash that Chuankang Bank is ready to deposit every day is 1.5 million, within 1.5 million, although Mr. Du opened, 1.5 million, he had to trouble Mr. Du to give me a phone call first." "What is the concept of 1.5 million?" At that time, the monthly salary of the army general was 850 yuan, and everyone could weigh it themselves.
Just as the so-called "suffering sees the truth", Liu Hangchen was able to help Du Yuesheng when he fell, on the one hand, it proved that he was a person to befriended, on the other hand, it also reflected the contacts accumulated by Du Yuesheng in his early years and his way of dealing with the world.