Before liberation, Shanghai was the largest city in Asia, with a population of more than 6 million, and was the largest industrial and commercial core city in China. In May 1949, the Chinese People's Liberation Army began to approach the city, and how to liberate the city intact became a headache for all the central leaders at that time.
Pictured| Old Shanghai
Before liberation, Chen Yi instructed the cadres and leaders of Sanye to say:
"The liberation of Shanghai is the last hurdle of the Chinese revolution, and we must be careful and cautious to complete this great test."
On May 20, preparations were made to take over Shanghai, and as long as the fighters allowed, they could launch a general offensive and liberate Shanghai. On the night of the 23rd, the various units of Sanye launched a general offensive against Shanghai, and in the early morning of the 25th, the People's Liberation Army occupied the downtown area of Shanghai south of the Suzhou Creek.
At this time, Tang Enbo saw that the general trend had gone, so he led the main forces of the 52nd and 54th Armies and other remnants to begin to withdraw from Shanghai one after another, and they boarded ships from Wusongkou and headed for the Zhoushan Islands. With the retreat of Tangbu, the situation on the battlefield began to change dramatically, and the entire Shanghai defense line began to collapse.
On May 27, our Party officially declared that this Shanghai Offensive Battle was completely victorious and Shanghai was completely liberated, and after 15 days of the Battle of Songhu, our army annihilated a total of 150,000 Kuomintang reactionaries, and has always insisted on fighting on the outside front, liberating Shanghai intact, and creating a miracle in the history of war.
Play well, discipline is better
The post-war takeover is an even more severe test for our Party. Before the war, all the departments of sanno had already conducted in-depth political education and repeatedly studied our party's "three major disciplines and eight points of attention" and "eight chapters of the law." In addition, based on the experience accumulated by the city before liberation, more detailed documents such as the "Code of Entry into the City", "Urban Discipline" and "Diplomatic Discipline" were studied and sent to all ministries for study and education. Even before entering Shanghai, the Sanye cadres wrote a letter of guarantee.
Pictured| Chen Yi
Chen Yi set strict requirements on the behavior of the troops after entering the city, and the most basic red line was "not to enter the houses.", and some people asked: What should I do if it rains, the wounded and sick? In this regard, Chen Yi firmly said:
"This is the bottom line, no matter what, it must be strictly enforced, saying that you can't enter people's houses, that is, you can't, no one has special circumstances, this is a 'meeting gift' given to the people of Shanghai by our People's Liberation Army!"
In the early morning of May 28, when the citizens of Shanghai opened their doors, the scene in front of them would be unforgettable, only to see the PLA soldiers sleeping row by row on the road, and since then, they have also understood that the era of Kuomintang reactionaries ruling Shanghai is over, and Shanghai will usher in a new history. It was also on this day that Chen Yi received orders from his superiors to serve as the mayor of Shanghai, and his main task was to restore Shanghai's economy at the first time, stabilize the citizens, and show the leadership and management ability of the Communists in China to the whole world and the people of the whole Chinese.
Soon after, Chen Yi, who was in danger, moved into the Shanghai Municipal Government Building and officially took over the mayor's office as the first mayor of Shanghai. In this 80-square-meter office, Chen Yi began to work day and night, in order to complete the tasks assigned by the organization and manage and restore The economic environment of Shanghai as soon as possible.
On this day, Chen Yi answered the phone in the office as usual to deal with government affairs, and when he was not long ago, the guard knocked on the door and came in, reporting:
"Chief! Have your letter! ”
At this time, Chen Yi did not look up, but just handled the government affairs in his hands and said to the guards:
"Read!"
The guard then read the contents of the letter aloud.
After the guards finished reading, Chen Yi returned to his senses, only to see that his brows were locked, and he asked for the letter from the guard's hand, and carefully read it from beginning to end.
This is a letter of help, the writer's name is Ling Weicheng, is an authentic Shanghai peasant woman, why did the peasant women of that era know how to write letters? Why does Chen Yi attach so much importance to her letters?
In fact, this woman has a lot of potential, and the matter she wrote for help is not only for herself, but for the sake of history. The content of the letter for help:
She had been using the three-story building at 466 Wusong Road in Shanghai and a vacant lot near Jiaozhou Road until now, asking the government to grant her permission to continue using them.
Ling Weicheng's real identity is the wife of the Kuomintang major general, you know, with the liberation of Shanghai, most of the Kuomintang relatives have been evacuated, and the houses and property they left behind have also been taken over by our army.
Below, let's follow the author to understand what is hidden in it.
When Chen Yi carefully read the contents of the letter, he immediately ordered the Housing Management Office and the Finance Office to grant her request, and the three floors were not rented for her to use free of charge, and the vacant land was not recovered.
Chen Yi has just taken office as mayor of Shanghai, and there are countless things that need to be dealt with every day.
Why did he take such a fancy to Ling Weicheng and personally order her request to be dealt with in his busy schedule? In fact, it is mainly related to her husband and a group of special people.
Her husband is Xie Jinyuan, and many people may be unfamiliar with this name, but his soldiers are famous anti-Japanese heroes, and they have a common and resounding name: eight hundred heroes.
Eight hundred brave men made a name for themselves on the battlefield
In July 1937, Japan launched a full-scale invasion of China, and soon the war spread to Shanghai, the Kuomintang reactionaries implemented the strategy of retreating and retaining strength, in order to allow the large troops to retreat safely, specially dispatched a part of the soldiers to guard the Shanghai Zhabei and divert the attention of the Japanese army.
Xie Jinyuan, who was already the deputy of the regiment at the time, took on this arduous task in this way, leading more than 400 people under his command to form a reinforcement battalion to resist the attack of the Japanese army, and in order to increase the momentum, it was said that there were 800 people, which is famous
"Eight Hundred Heroes"
The origin of this trip is the beginning of their fame and the beginning of the tragic life in the future.
After a period of research, Xie Jinyuan decided to use the Shanghai Sihang Warehouse as a stronghold to attract the Japanese army and cover the retreat of the large troops. Soon after, the Japanese army surrounded the warehouse, and since then, more than 400 fighters have started a fierce battle of 4 days and 4 nights in order to cover the retreat of the large troops, and under the continuous onslaught of the enemy, they desperately defended and killed more than 200 Japanese troops, so that the enemy could not move forward.
Eventually, the British, fearing that the scope of the battle would expand, put pressure on Chiang Kai-shek and demanded it
Retreat, under pressure from many sides, they took advantage of the relaxation of the Japanese army, and all of them broke through and retreated to the British concession. When they arrived here, Xie Jinyuan, who thought he was relieved, found that all this was a conspiracy of the British, and when they broke through to the British Concession after a difficult fight, they asked to disarm, originally Xie Jinyuan did not agree, but under the pressure of the above, the British also promised to escort them out of Shanghai, and they were forced to disarm.
But, to everyone's surprise, this was a trick of the British, and when the soldiers were disarmed, they were immediately detained, and they were imprisoned in a wasteland surrounded by barbed wire, and the British allowed them to be selfish and self-destructive, and sent soldiers to guard them from leaving the camp. Since then, the "Eight Hundred Heroes Battalion", which should have enjoyed the treatment of anti-Japanese heroes, has been driven to this desolate camp. From 1937 to December 1941, the surviving heroes were imprisoned here for four full years.
The miserable life of the lone army camp
They had only a few tents to shelter themselves from the wind and rain, and thanks to Xie Jinyuan's repeated insistence, they slowly built four bungalows, where they had been living for a year. “
Eight hundred brave men"
In the days of detention, citizens often came to visit here, but this did not improve their living conditions much, and I remember a Shanghai female student who had the privilege of visiting:
The moment I stepped into the camp, I was amazed by everything in the camp, and on the right hand side was a row of mud bungalows for the soldiers' barracks, with the slogan "Down with Japanese imperialism" written on the wall. Although the whole camp is desolate but orderly, the most impressive thing is that there is a flag-raising platform on the playground, the flag of the Republic of China, the slogans and national flags here, which cannot be seen outside, which makes my soul at that time very shaken.
How could they know that during the period of imprisonment, General Xie Jinyuan not only used all his strength to maintain the daily life of the soldiers, but also implemented militarized management of all the soldiers, got up at 4 o'clock, went to bed at 9 o'clock, ate on time every day, in addition to daily training, also taught the soldiers to read and write, opened sweaters and soap workshops, and carefully maintained their normal lives.
Xie Jinyuan is waiting, the soldiers are also waiting, they are always ready, waiting to go out again, to contribute to the defense of their motherland, but they do not know, all this will become a luxury.
In 1939, as the Japanese became more and more powerful in China, coupled with two years of imprisonment, Xie Jinyuan realized something. Soon after, he wrote to his parents:
If the day of the enemy's abduction, that is, the time when the man becomes a benevolent man.
One day in April 1941, Xie Jinyuan led the soldiers out of the exercise, except for the four soldiers who were late, all this was the same as usual, but what he did not expect was that he did not die under the enemy's guns, did not die on the battlefield, but died in the enemy's conspiracy, falling in this usual day.
When he called the four late soldiers to the side for a lecture, the four men suddenly took out their weapons and stabbed him violently, stabbing Xie Jinyuan to death on the spot. Later, we learned that these 4 people had already been bribed by the Japanese puppet government, because they could not let Xie Jinyuan surrender and submit, so they chose to assassinate. Ironically, the Kuomintang reactionaries, who did not care about his life, actually held a grand funeral for Xie Jinyuan after his death and posthumously named him a major general.
Shortly after Xie Jinyuan's death, the Pacific War broke out, the British had no time to take care of themselves, the Japanese army took over the concession, and at this time the "lone army camp" also lost its final guarantee. At that time, the Japanese Kou gave them two choices, one was to join the puppet army, and the other was to be sent to work as a coolie. Faced with the choice given by the Japanese Kou, more than 300 people did not choose the first one.
In this way, more than 300 warriors were divided into four teams and sent to different places to do coolies, and the most disobedient team was sent to work on a remote island. Since then, their fates have begun to take different paths, some escaping, some becoming tools to please the Japanese, some being sent to human experiments, and the only common denominator may be tragic abnormalities.
In 1945, Japan announced its unconditional surrender, the original more than 300 fighters, at this time only more than 100 people survived, after countless hardships they reunited in Shanghai, at this time only want to be able to live in peace.
Xie Jinyuan's wife returned to Shanghai
After Xie Jinyuan's death, Ling Weicheng's greatest wish was to return to Shanghai with his children to pay homage to her husband, but the Kuomintang ignored her requests until a few years later, when the surviving group of veterans took him back to Shanghai.
Ling Weicheng is a native of Shanghai, his parents are doing business in Shanghai, from snacks to wear, from a young age to receive advanced education, reading, violin accompanied Ling Weicheng for a long time. Until she was 20 years old, she took a fancy to 22-year-old Xie Jinyuan in a wedding, when Xie Jinyuan was not yet famous, and she was born in rural Guangdong. The two were greatly hindered together, and it was Ling Weicheng's insistence that they were together.
In September 1929, the two men were married to each other, and the two spent the next 7 years at the best time of their lives, the two respected each other, never quarreled, and had two daughters and a son. Until 1936, when the War of Resistance Against Japan was about to break out, for the safety of his wife and daughter, he planned to send his pregnant wife and children to his hometown in Guangdong, so that he could fight with peace of mind.
Xie Jinyuan personally sent them back to Guangdong, and on the occasion of parting, he said to his wife:
If I am not happy with you, I will not be able to kill the enemy with peace of mind, and on the day of victory, I will come to pick you up and take you back to Shanghai.
It was just that after this parting, the two of them could not get together again for the rest of their lives, and since then Ling Weicheng has also begun a hard life in the countryside.
During this period of time in his hometown in Guangdong, Ling Weicheng had an elderly in-laws, a newborn son, and an orphan daughter of the uncle's family who also had to take care of her, an old and weak woman with a big family. In order to survive, she took off her favorite cheongsam, put down her beloved violin, put on the cloth, took on the hoe, and walked to the field.
At the turn of cold and summer, Ling Weicheng did not have any complaints, and the only thing she hoped for was that her husband could take their mother and son back to Shanghai for reunion as soon as possible. However, years of waiting was ultimately a void, in April 1941, she waited for the bad news of Xie Jinyuan's sacrifice, and the moment she got the news, she sat on the ground in a daze, and the old people and children in the family cried and made a mess.
Although she lost the pillar of the family, but life still had to go on, the children's cries woke up Ling Weicheng, the following days, she settled in Guangdong, day and night, just to raise the children, until 1946, the surviving veterans invited her back to Shanghai.
When she traveled to many places, and finally took 4 children, standing in front of her husband's tomb, this strong woman showed a weak side, tears fell like rain, she completed Xie Jinyuan's parting account, raising children, respecting the elderly, but he forgot his promise and buried under this small tombstone. Ling Weicheng's return did not cause much of a stir, only reported in a corner of the newspaper: Xie Tuan's wife has returned to Shanghai. Xie Jinyuan's former subordinates, the surviving eight hundred brave men, noticed, and they began to set out for Shanghai.
Why did he ask Chen Yi for help after liberation?
From 1946 to 1949, what kind of life did Ling Weicheng and these anti-Japanese heroes live to make Ling Weicheng ask Mayor Chen Yi for help?
After Xie Jinyuan's sacrifice, Chiang Kai-shek, in order to buy people's hearts, promised to take care of Ling Weicheng's family and properly resettle the anti-Japanese veterans under him, but in fact, huh? In 1941, shortly after learning of Xie Jinyuan's sacrifice, Ling Weicheng went to Chongqing to seek help from Chiang Kai-shek, but all he got was one sentence:
"After the victory of the War of Resistance, the state will certainly take care of you!"
In addition to the pension of 50,000 french dollars, no practical help was given, and with inflation, the 50,000 legal tenders were a drop in the bucket.
Even in 1946, the travel and accommodation expenses to Shanghai were funded by well-wishers. After arriving in Shanghai, she was invited by her husband's surviving subordinates to a building at 466 Wusong Road, which is the building mentioned in the letter.
This 3-story house, the second floor is where Ling Weicheng's mother and son live, and the others are divided into small cubicles, where these veterans live, and this has become a home for them. After Ling Weicheng settled down here, the first problem he encountered was how to help these veterans solve their livelihood problems.
At first, she thought about letting the veterans take over a dock so that they could make a living, but they were too naïve, the docks in Shanghai were mixed, they had no background, and they were easily troubled by the police. Later, she thought of opening up a tram route so that the veterans could work as drivers and other jobs, but they were once again destroyed by the police.
She began to realize that someone was targeting their group of veterans, so she once again embarked on the road to Chongqing, trying to get Chiang Kai-shek to help them solve their livelihood problems. However, compared with the first time, this time Chiang Kai-shek and his wife were too lazy to pretend, and just coldly threw a sentence to her:
"We will arrange for the Shanghai Municipal Government to take care of you"
Send her away.
Ling Weicheng, who returned to Shanghai, began to look for the Shanghai government, but in the end it was all empty talk, everyone played leather ball on their affairs, and no one would bother for this group of veterans who had no value.
After clearly seeing the faces of the Kuomintang reactionaries, she began to recognize the facts clearly, asked for people everywhere, and solved the employment problems of veterans one by one. However, there are still some veterans who have left lifelong disabilities on the battlefield who cannot find jobs, and in the end, they have come up with a solution.
At that time, the soldiers were in chaos, and people in many places would flee to Shanghai, most of these people were relatively poor, and there was no place to stay in Shanghai, So Ling Weicheng and the veterans cleaned up the dozens of acres of open space around their husband's cemetery, rented them to these refugees, and provided them with protection at the same time, so that these refugees could also live.
The collected rent is managed by Ling Weicheng, excluding the education and basic living expenses of a small number of children, and the remaining money is distributed to each veteran separately. It lasted until the liberation of Shanghai in 1949, and the building they lived in and the land they circled belonged to the assets of the Kuomintang reactionaries and needed to be confiscated and redistributed and arranged by our army.
The liberation of Shanghai also gave Ling Weicheng an opportunity, because all the past had already made them lose trust in the Kuomintang reactionaries, and the benevolence of the Chinese People's Liberation Army had long been well known, so not long after the liberation of Shanghai, she wrote a letter asking for help, hoping that our party could properly place these anti-Japanese heroes.
Soon after, according to Chen Yi's arrangement, the house and land were used by them as usual, and Ling Weicheng was also the deputy director of a nursery, and the veterans who had no jobs wanted to return to their hometowns were also properly arranged.
At that time, many veterans who were not native to Shanghai were ready to return to their hometowns, and before parting, they would come to the wife of the regimental commander who had been taking care of them here to say goodbye, looking at these anti-Japanese heroes who were born and died with their husbands, and every time, Ling Weicheng would give them a little savings, and instructed them to live well after returning to their hometowns, so that the regimental commander could rest assured, and when the veterans had returned to their hometowns, the land would also be returned to our party.
Ling Weicheng's life in his later years was very stable, and his children and grandchildren were also talented, and he died of illness in Shanghai on January 6, 1991, at the age of 84. According to her last wishes, the descendants buried her next to Xie Jinyuan.
In 2005, Yang Yangzheng, a 91-year-old veteran of the "Lone Army Camp" who was already full of white hair, returned to Shanghai on behalf of his former brothers, and he saluted in front of Xie Jinyuan's tomb. "Report regimental commander, Yang Deyu came to see you" Yang Deyu is his name in the "LoneLy Barracks", when he was only 22 years old, and his words made everyone present cry.
From how to treat veterans, we can see why Chiang Kai-shek failed and how popular the Chinese People's Liberation Army was. With this article, I would like to pay tribute to General Xie Jinyuan,
and all the martyrs who died in the War of Resistance.