The "Anhui Incident" was a surprise attack launched by the Kuomintang diehards during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression against China against the Headquarters of the New Fourth Army in Central China.
After seven days and seven nights of bitter fighting, the New Fourth Army's more than 9,000 people, only more than 2,000 people of the first column, led by commander and political commissar Fu Qiutao, broke out of the siege, and the rest of the few were captured and most of them were killed. ''The Anhui Southern Incident' shocked China and foreign countries!
Gu Zhutong, deputy commander of the Third Theater, once ordered: "'Fight all the nets and capture Ye Xiang." The military commander Ye Ting was arrested during the battle, and the military political commissar Xiang Ying became the focus of public attention. However, Xiang Ying's whereabouts are unknown.
01, Xiang Ying is missing
The Kuomintang knew that Xiang Ying was very difficult to catch, and this person was an "old guerrilla" who had always been haunted in the deep mountains and old forests, not to mention that the southern Anhui area was where the mountains were high and densely forested.
On 16 July, Shangguan Yunxiang, general counselor of the Third Theater Command and commander-in-chief of the Thirty-second Army, sent a telegram to the Anhui Sixth Security Command offering a reward of 5,000 silver dollars and the arrest of Xiang Ying. The telegram ordered: 'Xi Xun RaoJing, Nanfang, and Fan counties should immediately mobilize the county's township baojia chiefs to conduct an inventory of the whole county according to each household, so as not to slip through the net. After a thorough investigation, Xiang Ying still heard about it.
Where is Xiang Ying? Both the enemy and us are paying close attention.
02, finally there is a message from Xiang Ying
It was not until April 1941, a year later, that the news came that when Li Xiekun, the county magistrate of Jingde County, Anhui Province, was out on a tour of the township, a suspicious person was found in Yuping Township, and after interrogation, this person confessed that his name was Li Zhenghua, a secret agent of the Third Theater, but he could not get his documents. After repeated interrogations, this person suddenly confessed, saying that his real name was Liu Houzong, who had served as the commander and aide-de-camp of the New Fourth Army, and that he had fled the battlefield with Xiang Ying and more than forty other people during the Anhui Incident. They hid in caves in the mountains. On February 16, he beat Xiang Ying to death and fled...
February 16 in the lunar calendar, that is, march 13 in the Gregorian calendar.
When the county magistrate heard this, the matter was of great importance, and liu Houzong's confession would be doubtful. Therefore, on April 28, liu Houzong was accompanied by the county's special agents into the mountain. They climbed on the bird path, and it was nearly noon before they approached a stone cave. That was where Xiang Ying was killed. The agent was about to enter the cave when three men in short black coats appeared. Liu Hou always said, "'Not a good person'," and the agents searched separately. In the chaos, Liu Hou always took the opportunity to slip away!
The agent entered the cave and found four chess pieces, a small half of a foreign candle, and a small comb, indicating that there were indeed people living in the cave, but there were no bodies. Because Liu Houzong escaped, the case became an unsolved case. That cave, locals call it Bee Cave.
03, the key person Liu Houzong
In October 1941, Liu Houzong was arrested again. He confessed that he had beaten Xiang Ying to death and robbed him of more than 24,000 yuan in national currency and 825 gold coins. Then Liu Houzong asked for the formalities of surrendering himself and asked for rewards for meritorious deeds. The Kuomintang Anhui Southern Administration did not turn himself in or reward him for his merits, but imprisoned him. Later, in the winter of 1942, he was tied up with ropes and taken to Chongqing, where he was imprisoned in Cell No. 6 under the Zhadong Guards.
The Eighth Route Army learned of Xiang Ying's murder by Liu Houzong in 1942. In addition to Xiang Ying, Zhou Zikun, deputy chief of staff of the New Fourth Army, also died at the hands of Liu Hou. At that time, there was a report entitled "Report on the Murder of Xiang Ying and Zhou Zikun", which was sent to Yan'an.
Liu Houzong manages books in prison, can walk around the prison patio during the day, and is locked in the cell at night. In November 1949, the People's Liberation Army approached Chongqing, and the Kuomintang troops carried out a massacre in Zhadidong on the 27th, but Liu Houzong was released. In the chaos of the soldiers, Liu Houzong tried to escape for his life, but he was stabbed by someone because he rushed to board the truck. At this time, Lu Jingqing, director of the Baigongguan Detention Center, who happened to be driving by, saw him, took him to the car, walked a ride, and dumped him again. In this way, Liu Houzong, who was seriously injured, died in chaos.
Liu Houzong did not say where Xiang Ying's body went until his death. Was Xiang Ying really killed by him? Where are the remains?
04, the truth of Xiang Ying's death
The truth of Xiang Ying's death came out in 1980, that is, thirty-nine years after Xiang Ying's death!
It all started with a report.
In 1980, Hu Hua, a historian at Chinese Min University, gave a report entitled "Counseling answers to several questions in party history", in which he talked about the deaths of Xiang Ying and Zhou Zikun and mentioned Wang Cheng, a guard of Zhou Zikun.
An old man named Huang Cheng accidentally read Hu Hua's report, which evoked memories of the past and was very excited. He decided to tell the secret that had been hidden in his heart for decades, and on April 5, 1980, he wrote to Hu Hua, saying, "I am the guard Wang Cheng you mentioned in your speech -- the name is wrong, it should be Huang Cheng."'
According to Huang Cheng's recollection, after seven days and nights of fierce fighting, he and Zhou Zikun broke through the siege and came to the mountain behind the Stone Well Pit and hid for a few days. Coincidentally, one day in a big pit, I actually met Xiang Ying and a dozen other people. Therefore, the two of them joined Xiang Ying's team and hid for a month in a big mountain's baogu shed. By early March, they had hooked up with Liu Kui, a staff officer at the military headquarters, and found the local underground organization. So on the night of March 11, they were led by Liu Kui to Liankeng, where they stayed at the home of a man named Jiang Qigui, and ate a "beautiful meal"—cooked corn rice. At dawn the next day, under the leadership of Jiang Qigui, they went up the mountain. The mountain is extremely steep, and there is a steep little cave in the middle of the mountain, the Bee Cave. There were only four people living in the cave, and the rest lived in the col below the mountain. The four people who lived in the bee cave were Xiang Ying, Zhou Zikun, Huang Cheng, and Xiang Ying's aide-de-camp, Liu Houzong.
After settling down, Xiang Ying and Zhou Zikun found some stones to make chess pieces and played chess on a stone. At this time, it was raining heavily outside, so that it was snowing in the rain. At about 11 o'clock in the night, they fell asleep. Since the depths of the cave were somewhat damp, Huang Cheng lay in the innermost part, and then lay down from the inside out in turn zhou Zikun, Xiang Ying, and Liu Houzong.
Before dawn, Huang Cheng was sleeping soundly, when suddenly there were two gunshots, banging and banging, and he was awakened. At this moment, a shiny flashlight shone on his face, dazzling him, and then another shot hit him in the right arm, and he passed out, not knowing anything. ......
Later, Liu Kui and them went up the mountain and into the cave, only to learn that Liu Houzong had defected, killed Xiang Ying and Zhou Zikun, stole the money, and absconded. When they saw that Huang Cheng's heart was still beating, they carried him down the mountain and arranged for him to recuperate at his hometown; then, they went up the mountain and transferred the bodies of Xiang Ying and Zhou Zikun to another cave, so the Kuomintang agents did not find their bodies. After 1949, the remains of Xiang and Tuesday were moved to nanjing Yuhuatai Martyrs Cemetery.
Huang Cheng's letter completely revealed the inside story of Xiang Ying's death.