Speaking of the Green Gang, it can be said that no one knows and no one knows. The gang was founded during the Yongzheng dynasty and was later divided into Hongmen by the Tiandihui under the banner of "anti-Qing and restoration". By the time of the late Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the People's Republic, the generations had been passed down to the four words of greatness, understanding, enlightenment, and learning. Zhang Renkui, known as the "Godfather of the Republic of China", is a "big" generation with a very high generation, and the Golden Rong and Du Yuesheng we know are only his apprentices and disciples.
Zhang Renkui's hometown is in Teng County, Shandong Province, and it is said that he learned martial arts from his cousin from a young age and practiced a good kung fu. After the Sino-Japanese War, the Boxer Rebellion broke out all over Shandong, and the young and vigorous Zhang Renkui also joined in. The head of the local Boxer Rebellion was Ma Fengshan, the twentieth generation of the Qing Gang's "Li" characters, who admired Zhang Renkui very much, accepted him as an apprentice, and ranked him in the twenty-first generation of "big" characters.
After the Boxer Rebellion was suppressed, Zhang Renkui followed Xu Baoshan around the Qinggang brother Xu Baoshan, and by the time Xu Baoshan was assassinated by Chen Qimei, Zhang Renkui had already taken the position of brigade commander. After Yuan Shikai's death, the Beiyang warlords split, and the Jiangsu area guarded by Zhang Renkui became the territory of the direct line, and Zhang naturally became a member of the direct line. Considering his influence in Jiangbei, Feng Guozhang appointed Zhang Renkui as the defender of Tonghai Town and promoted him to the rank of general of the army.
At that time, once many people embarked on the so-called right path, they were very jealous of others mentioning their past, just like Zhang Zuolin, the king of the Northeast, who was very concerned about others saying that he was born of banditry.
Zhang Renkui was not like this, he never shyed away from his gang identity, after being promoted to the position of envoy of Tonghai Town, many military and political leaders and industrial and commercial circles looked for ways to ask for recommendations and worshiped him as a teacher. Because there were more and more apprentices, later, Zhang Renkui directly handled political affairs under the name of the "Taiye" of the Qing Gang, because whether it was the police station, the official court, or the leader of the Chamber of Commerce, all of them were Zhang's apprentices.
In May 1935, Zhang Renkui's "Ren Society" was established, and most of its members were upper-class figures in society, at this time Zhang Renkui had withdrawn from the military circles and wholeheartedly became his green gang boss. Because of its rapid development, the "Renshe" and the "Rongshe" of Jin Jinrong and the "Hengshe" of Du Yuesheng stood on their feet and became one of the three most powerful groups in the Shanghai Gang. Later, Zhang Renkui had more than 30,000 disciples and grandchildren in the country, and there were 3,000 or 4,000 backbone members, infiltrating all walks of life in the Republic of China, and Zhang Renkui became the "godfather of the Republic of China".
After the outbreak of the Shanghai Anti-Japanese War, Zhang Renkui's "Ren Society" collected a large number of military materials for the anti-Japanese army. After the fall of Shanghai, because of his advanced age, Zhang Renkui stayed in the French Concession in Shanghai, saying that he was sick and closed the door, refusing to cooperate with the Japanese, and secretly protecting the anti-Japanese patriots and giving them financial support. After perceiving Zhang Renkui's anti-Japanese activities, the Japanese sent the Shanghai commander and Bushido master Yano Yao to provoke him in the name of a contest.
It should be known that Zhang Renkui was famous in Jianghuai with a single knife when he was young, and once broke into dozens of people to grab the knife with his bare hands and rescue his companions who were surrounded by them. Although he is now nearly eighty years old, the hero's true color is not diminished that year, he took a large knife and calmly faced Yano Yao, defeating the opponent in only two rounds. Only to see Zhang Renkui use the handle of the sword to continuously click on the acupuncture point of Yano Yao's wrist, forcing the other party to abandon the sword and return in defeat. However, the Japanese did not give up, and sent various people to coerce and induce Zhang, who was angry and fell ill, and finally died on December 24, 1944.
The death of Zhang Renkui, the "godfather of the Republic of China", is tantamount to the end of the traditional Qinggang, and at this moment, the new tycoon of the Qinggang has already risen. If it is said that the Qinggang in Zhang Renkui's era still had strict gang rules and formal etiquette, but in the hands of Jin Jinrong and Du Yuesheng, the Qinggang had lost the soul of "stealing and having a way", and only had a shell left.