In the course of the Red Army's twenty-five thousand-mile long march, in addition to the participation of the Red Army, there were some foreigners and even senior Kuomintang generals, including foreigners Li De, Wu Ting, and Hong Hong, and the only senior Kuomintang general was the only one, who was the protagonist Zhang Zhenhan we want to talk about today.
Zhang Zhenhan was originally a lieutenant general of the Kuomintang, because after being captured after being defeated, he followed our army to participate in the Long March, and during the Long March, he developed inseparable feelings for our army and our party, and once wrote to his wife to help support the Red Army materials, and his wife desperately sold her property to support her husband, and after the founding of the People's Republic of China, Zhang Zhenhan became the vice mayor of Changsha.
Zhang Zhenhan's early experience
Zhang Zhenhan was born in 1898, is a native of Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province, he was born, it was the Qing Dynasty has been in turmoil, the people's life can be described as a people's livelihood, although the area he is in is the Northern Jiangsu Plain, not only pleasant climate, but also rich in products, as long as hard work and ability, will not be starved to death.
But even so, Zhang Zhenhan's early life was still relatively bleak, his father had died of illness early, leaving only him and his mother to rely on each other, the mother was a very dignified person, after the death of his father, he swore to die and was resolutely unwilling to marry others, and he lived a poor life with Zhang Zhenhan alone.
Although the mother and son live poorly, but the spirit is not lacking, since childhood, the mother has taught Zhang Zhenhan by example that he should be a man with an iron backbone, he cannot shrink back in the face of things, and he must choose to go forward bravely, under the education of his mother, Zhang Zhenhan has developed a spirit of not accepting defeat and the ability to distinguish between right and wrong since he was a child, all of which played a vital role in his later life.
His mother not only educated him to be a man, but also used his thin savings for Zhang Zhenhan to go to a private school to learn knowledge, although he did not read much and dropped out of school because of family difficulties, but his mother was able to insist on sending him to school in that extremely difficult environment, which was already quite rare.
Zhang Zhenhan because he had no money to continue studying, so he went home to farm to reduce his mother's burden, it can be said that he is a fairly sensible child, coupled with his appearance looks very spiritual, so when his uncle saw him when he returned home to the province, he felt that the child's future was unlimited, so he specially recommended Zhang Zhenhan to the army school for further study.
Zhang Zhenhan was grateful to his uncle, but also cherished this opportunity to study, studied hard and seriously during the school, did not live up to everyone's expectations of him, and later with excellent results was admitted to the Baoding Army Officer School Artillery Section for further study, at that time and he studied in a school there were also Bai Chongxi, He Jian and Zhang Zhizhong and other people, this period of study, to Zhang Zhenhan's later development provided a good political capital.
After graduating from the Baoding Military Academy, Zhang Zhenhan became a company commander of the Feng Army in 1924 and the commander of the 283rd Regiment of the 142nd Brigade of the 48th Division of the National Revolutionary Army in 1928.
From graduation to becoming a lieutenant general division commander, Zhang Zhenhan only took seven or eight years, the key was the 41st Division at that time, but the main division of the 10th Army of the Nationalist Army, which was enough to see that Zhang Zhenhan's status and identity in the Nationalist Army were quite unusual, otherwise it would have been impossible to have such a high status.
Defeated and captured to participate in the Long March
The station of the 41st Division is located in Changsha, Hunan Province, once Hunan Province held the Provincial Student Games in Changsha, the division commander Zhang Zhenhan was invited to watch the entire process of the Games, and became the awarding guest of the women's volleyball competition, it was this award opportunity, Zhang Zhenhan met his future wife Deng Juexian.
Deng Juexian was born in a rich family, good figure, beautiful appearance, received a good education since childhood, very interested in sports, when she was the captain of the women's volleyball team, when the women's volleyball team won the championship on stage to receive the award, as the captain of the stage to accept Zhang Zhenhan's award, that is, the moment of look, Zhang Zhenhan fell in love with Deng Juexian at first sight.
After the game, Zhang Zhenhan specially entrusted people to inquire about Deng Juexian's situation, after learning that Deng Juexian was not yet married, Zhang Zhenhan did not hesitate at all, and immediately visited the door to mention his relatives in person, after Zhang Zhenhan repeatedly mentioned his relatives, Deng Juexian was finally touched by his sincere attitude and agreed to marry Zhang Zhenhan as his wife.
In 1933, Zhang Zhenhan and Deng Juexian held a grand wedding in Changsha, this wedding was grand in scale, caused quite a stir at the time, after marriage the two small families lived a sweet and happy life, but unfortunately the good times were not long, only two years later, that is, in 1935, Zhang Zhenhan was ordered to participate in the task of assisting Xuan'en, before the expedition, Zhang Zhenhan said that he would definitely take Down He Long, but he did not know at all, this plan has long been mastered by our army, so Zhang Zhenhan led the 41st Division to Hubei in the process, Our army arranged a small number of troops to pretend to attack Xuan'en, but the main army was ambushed on the road that the 41st Division had to pass, and when Zhang Zhenhan passed, it was immediately surrounded by our army.
Our army hit Zhang Zhenhan's division headquarters with mortars, the radio station was quickly destroyed, and lost contact with the outside world, even the chief of staff of the division was killed on the spot, Zhang Zhenhan was of course injured, the 41st Division experienced this ambush, the army was scattered, and finally was completely annihilated by our army, and the division commander Zhang Zhenhan was also directly captured by our army.
After becoming a prisoner of the Red Army, Zhang Zhenhan was very worried that the Red Army would abuse him or directly shoot him, and he was worried every day, after all, he still had his wife in his family waiting for him to come home, if he ended his life like this, he was really sorry for his family.
Fortunately, this kind of worry soon dissipated, because the officers and men of the Red Army had a very good attitude toward him, and He Long personally went to visit him, had a long talk with him, and comforted him not to worry about his family; after Zhang Zhenhan's mood was a little more stable, the Red Army also specially invited him to give a lecture to the officers and men of the Red Army.
In the process of contact with the Red Army, Zhang Zhenhan was gradually moved by the attitude of the Red Army, he understood that the Red Army would not kill him, but Zhang Zhenhan was still ashamed of some of his previous acts against the Red Army, so in the later battles, Zhang Zhenhan assisted the Red Army to use two shells to blow up the enemy's two bunkers and help the Red Army win the Battle of Longshan.
In November 1935, Zhang Zhenhan participated in the Long March with the Red Second Front, and during the Long March, our army's care for him was also quite touching, at that time, due to the lack of materials, only the senior generals of our army were eligible to enjoy the treatment of mules and grooms, Zhang Zhenhan was a prisoner, and our army also arranged mules and horses for him according to the treatment of senior generals, and these things made Zhang Zhenhan very moved.
Throughout the course of the Long March, Zhang Zhenhan had completely integrated himself with the Red Army, and he had great respect for the ideals and beliefs of our Party and our army, and at the same time he was even more unaccustomed to some corrupt styles of the Kuomintang army. When he learned that the Red Army was short of materials, he wrote a letter to his wife, who was thousands of miles away, asking her to help him get some materials to support the Red Army.
His wife had always been worried about Zhang Zhenhan, and when she received Zhang Zhenhan's letter and learned that he was still alive, Deng Juexian was excited, and immediately decided to sell her family property, and went back to her mother's house to take some money, buying medicines, telescopes, compasses and other materials that the Red Army urgently needed, and later asked Zhang Zhenhan's classmate He Jian when he was at the Baoding Army School to help inquire about the news of the Red Army, and successfully delivered these materials to the Red Army, which helped the Red Army a big favor.
After Zhang Zhenhan was captured, many people advised the young and beautiful Deng Jue to remarry first, but she never gave up a little hope, insisted on waiting for Zhang Zhenhan, after learning the news of Zhang Zhenhan, she was even more obligated to go to Yan'an thousands of miles away to meet her husband for many years, after the two met, they hugged their headaches and cried, tears flowed, and that scene touched everyone present.
Zhang Zhenhan's evening view
After the outbreak of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression in 1937, the two parties cooperated again, Zhang Zhenhan returned to the Kuomintang area, as a successful businessman, once again entered the circle of Kuomintang military and political leaders, and later lost contact with the Red Army due to illness, and after recovering from illness, he returned to Hankou and Chongqing in the Kuomintang area to do business.
In the first few years of the War of Resistance Against Japan, Zhang Zhenhan had been living idly in Chongqing, and only then under the sponsorship of Chen Cheng and He Yingqin and others did he go out of the mountains again, and in 1943 he served as a senior staff officer of the Military Commission.
In March 1949, seeing that the People's Liberation Army was about to achieve complete victory, Zhang Zhenhan joined the Kuomintang Revolutionary Committee without hesitation, engaged in the peaceful liberation of Hunan, and later participated in the Hunan Uprising, and in August of that year, he welcomed the People's Liberation Army into the city in Changsha, and Changsha was successfully liberated.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Zhang Zhenhan served as a member of the Changsha Municipal People's Government, a vice mayor, a member of the Standing Committee of the Hunan Provincial Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, and a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consult
epilogue
In 1967, Zhang Zhenhan was persecuted to death during a decade of turmoil, at the age of 69, and did not restore his reputation until February 1980.
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