1
The son of the blacksmith entered the military camp and turned to Lingnan chengxing
In the summer of 1898, Zhong Fangjun, who later became the brigade commander of the 459th Brigade of the 153rd Division of the 63rd Army of the National Revolutionary Army, was born into a peasant family in Ningshan, Huangcun District, Heyuan County, Guangdong Province, who also operated a blacksmith shop. When Zhong Fangjun was young, while studying, he gave his father a hand in the blacksmith shop and learned the art of striking iron with one hand.
Zhong Fangjun
Later, the Zhong family went bankrupt due to a lawsuit. Regarding this lawsuit, some data show that because the agricultural tools made by the Zhong family are of high quality and fair price, they are quite popular with the peasants in the four miles and eight townships, and the local bullies are red-eyed and oppress the Zhong family. Zhong Fangjun went to the county government to file a complaint and lost the case, the bully's oppression intensified, and the Zhong family's agricultural tool business could not be maintained. Zhong Fangjun had to go to Xingning County, Where He was a soldier in Li Jiezhi (later vice chairman of the Guangdong Provincial Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference).
After joining the 1st Division of the Cantonese Army, because Zhong Fangjun could bear hardships and stand hard work, and he was also literate, he was soon promoted to clerk, and a year later he was promoted to squad leader.
In August 1925, after the 1st Division of the Guangdong Army was expanded into the 4th Army of the National Revolutionary Army, Zhong Fangjun was promoted to the commander of the 3rd Battalion of the 33rd Regiment (Commander Huang Zhenqiu) of the 11th Division (Division Commander Chen Jitang) of the Army. Six months later, Li Jiezhi was transferred to the commander of the 2nd Battalion of the regiment. Li Jiezhi had a very good impression of Zhong Fangjun, and he commented on Zhong: "Witty, brave, patriotic." After that, Zhong Fangjun participated in the Second Crusade with his troops, contributing to ending the situation of warlord division in Guangdong.
After the start of the Northern Expedition, Zhong Fangjun accompanied his troops to defend the Qinlian area, during which he repeatedly commanded troops to suppress local bandits, and was promoted to the commander of the 3rd Battalion for his merits. In April 1931, it was reported that "(Guangzhou Communications) The 8th Route Army of Guangdong actively carried out the work of suppressing bandits, and since the zhong fangjun department of the 3rd regiment of the 1st Independent Brigade had returned to Zhaoqing, the authorities had extorted money from the brigade because there were bandits in Luoding, and it was urgent to eliminate the bandits, because they sent the Zhong regiment to garrison the area around the mouth of the Luoding River to calm the bandits. ”
After the victory of the Northern Expedition, Zhong Fangjun successively served as the commander of the 3rd Battalion of the 235th Regiment of the 118th Brigade of the 59th Division, the commander of the 6th Regiment of the Independent 2nd Division, and other positions.
In June 1936, Zhong Fangjun participated in the "Two Guangdong Incident" with his troops. After the fall of Chen Jitang, the Guangdong army was reorganized by the Nationalist government, and Yu Hanmou took over the military power in Guangdong, called the 4th Route Army. In this change, Zhong Fangjun, 38, was promoted to brigadier general of the 459th Brigade of the 153rd Division.
In July 1937, the War of Resistance Broke Out in full swing, and from September onwards, Guangdong troops were continuously sent to the battlefields of Shanghai and Nanjing to fight against the Japanese army, and the 153rd Division was transferred to Bao'an and Dongguan. During Zhong Fangjun's garrison in Dongguan, he repeatedly asked Miao to participate in the war, but he was rejected by his superiors on the grounds that he was defending Guangdong.
2
The lone army fought a bloody battle against the enemy, although it was defeated
On October 12, 1938, the Japanese 18th Division and the 104th Division landed in Daya Bay and advanced inland. Among them, the 18th Division (Division Commandery Nagana Makoto) successively broke through the defensive lines of the 151st Division, the 1st Division of the 153rd Division, and the Independent 20th Brigade, and captured Huiyang on the 15th, and then ordered the advance team (composed of the 22nd Cavalry Brigade, the 1st Brigade of the 56th Regiment, the 10th and 51st Independent Light Armored Vehicle Squadrons, and the commander was served by Masaji Koike, the commander of the 22nd Cavalry Brigade) to depart from Boluo on the afternoon of the 17th and continue to attack in the direction of Guangzhou.
Yu Hanmou, the main commander of the Chinese side at the time, said: "Those who fought in Guangdong had three battles: Huiguang, Northern Guangdong and Liangkou, and I lost one defeat and two victories." At the Battle of Huiguang, the Japanese army mobilized more than 40,000 troops, navy and air force, landed on Huiyang and Daya Bay, and attacked along the Huibo and Bozeng Highways. Our garrison consisted of only one ear each of the 151st Division and the 153rd Division, and fought in Huiyang, Tamsui, Pinghu, Pingshan, Boluo, Zhengguo, and Hengshan. ”
The enemy formed a situation of outnumbered and outnumbered, and the soldiers who fought against the Japanese army head-on faced with an extremely fierce battlefield of Shuluo.
In order to block the Japanese offensive, the Commander-in-Chief of the Fourth Theater of Operations urgently dispatched Zhong Fangjun's 459th Brigade to Jiuzitan in the Boluo area to the Iron Field to block the Japanese army. After receiving the order, Zhong Fangjun was extremely excited, because he finally waited for the opportunity to defend his family and defend the country. On the morning of October 17, after the arrival of the 459th Brigade, it immediately rushed to build fortifications and held the town of Futian with the main force.
On October 17, 1938, the Japanese army launched the Battle of Zengcheng in Guangzhou in order to blockade the Chinese sea communication line and cooperate with the Battle of Wuhan. Yu Hanmou telephoned Chiang Kai-shek, who was still in Wuhan, for instructions, and Chiang ordered Yu to abandon Guangzhou, withdraw 4 infantry divisions, 1 independent brigade, and 1 artillery regiment of the combat troops to the north to defend the heyuan, Xinfeng, and Yingde lines to defend Shaoguan.
On the same day, the Japanese advance troops of about a thousand people, under the cover of the air force, searched and advanced along the Boluo to Zengcheng highway and marched towards the provincial capital of Guangzhou. At that time, Zhong Fangjun was ordered to lead his troops to Huiyang, Boluo, Conghua and other areas to fight against the Japanese army.
At dawn on 18 October, the advance team of the Japanese 18th Division reached the forward position of the 459th Brigade and launched a fierce attack. Taking advantage of the favorable terrain, Zhong Fangjun constantly ordered the various departments to make full use of the terrain to guard the commanding heights and block the passes and valleys by telephone. With tanks as the precursor, the bell department covered the infantry march, and the large troops hid in the small woods, unexpectedly, and launched a head-on attack on the Japanese army. Machine guns, rifles, and mortars were fired simultaneously for a while, and the sound was tremendous, the valley thundered, and the Japanese army was in a chaotic mess.
Soon, the sky was bright, and the follow-up troops of the Japanese army arrived one after another, and the war escalated. At 8:00 a.m. on the morning of the 18th, the Japanese artillery had already occupied the high ground and violently bombarded Zhong Fangjun's troops, coupled with the two wings of the Japanese cavalry, the enemy was outnumbered, and the battle situation was obviously unfavorable to our army. The fierce fighting continued until noon, and the battlefield was littered with corpses. Due to the Japanese air superiority, Zhong Fangjun suffered heavy casualties. At 2 p.m. on the same day, the 1st Brigade of the Japanese 56th Wing (Wing Commander Ma Yuankunosuke) broke through the defense line of the 916th Regiment, and the regimental commander Huang Zhihong was seriously wounded in the fierce battle.
After learning of the situation of the 916th Regiment, Zhong Fangjun prepared to lead the special agent platoon to the position of the 916th Regiment to direct the counterattack, but before he could act, he encountered the 916th Regiment's defeat. Zhong Fangjun was silent when he saw this, and constantly shook his head and sighed. Soon, the 459th Brigade ran out of ammunition, the soldiers were tired, and the enemy was increasing, the position collapsed completely, and Zhong Fangjun was forced to order a retreat.
At 4 p.m. on the 18th, the town of Futian was captured by the Japanese army. According to the pre-war deployment, in addition to Zhong Fangjun's 459th Brigade, there were also the Lin Junxun Regiment of the 151st Division and the Ye Zhinan Regiment of the 186th Division. However, after the battle began, only the 459th Brigade single-handedly attacked the enemy front, and the remaining two regiments did not arrive.
According to Xiao Bingjun, a political instructor of the 916th Regiment of the 459th Brigade, who witnessed the Futian battle, xiao Bingjun recalled: "After the troops withdrew, I escorted the wounded regimental commander Huang Zhihong to a small Merlin, and when I saw the brigade commander Zhong Fangjun and Chen Rongshu, chief of staff of the brigade headquarters, sitting in the telephone room at the edge of the forest, I immediately reported on the retreat of the troops and the injuries of the commander of the Huang regiment. Brigadier Zhong was silent, constantly shaking his head and sighing, and then took out a stack of banknotes (2,000 yuan) from his body and asked me to hand over the regimental headquarters military supplies as food for the troops, and instructed us to escort Commander Huang to the rear for recuperation. This was the last time he saw Zhong Fangjun.
3
The general drank the bomb and the whole army mourned
According to the Chronicle of the Generals of Guangdong in the Republic of China, brigade commander Zhong Fangjun "died in the battle to block the Japanese army in Zengcheng.". Historians believe that Zhong Fangjun was the first major general to die after the Japanese invasion of Guangdong, and the only senior general to die in the Battle of Guangzhou.
There are several different versions of the details of Zhong Fangjun's martyrdom, all of which are tragic and tragic.
After Xiao Bingjun arrived at Weng Yuan, he heard Brigadier Zhong's guards returning from the front to report that since the end of the Battle of Futian, Brigadier Zhong had been defeated by his troops and had no support, so he asked him to fight again, and there was no possibility, and he arrived at Shitan that night. However, Brigadier Zhong had already made up his mind to repay the country with his death, and when he saw the guards leave his side, he ran out into the river. Since there was no one to rescue him in time, when he was discovered, Brigadier Zhong had already died, and the local people prepared coffins to bury the stone beach. When the news came, the whole army mourned. The 153rd Division withdrew to Qingyuan Hengshi and remained behind the enemy in Bao'an to carry out guerrilla warfare with Chen Yaoshu's 457th Brigade, which had also returned to the army; the 153rd Division was reorganized and reorganized. In the spring of 1939, the 153rd Division sent Cheng Qi, the flag officer of the former 459th Brigade, to Shitan to find Zhong Fangjun's body, re-prepare the coffin, and transport it back to his hometown for burial.
According to the "Declaration" reported on November 14, 1938, Zhang Ruigui's Zhong Fangjun single-handedly attacked the enemy front, flanking the Japanese troops in Zengcheng and Conghua, but the Defenders of Guangzhou could not stop the Japanese army head-on, so that the Zhongbu lost more than 1,000 people, and the Commander of the Zhong Brigade also committed suicide in anger, but the bullet entered from the chest and obliquely out of the left shoulder, and did not hit the key point. His subordinates carried the wounded Zhong Fangjun across the East River, and on the way they encountered japanese troops, zhongbu turned to Sanduozhu and ordered an immediate counterattack. When the Japanese army saw that they were a crippled army, they despised them and did not want to be annihilated by the bell department more than 2,000 people in various places of Sando Zhu and White Mangohua. Zhongbu cut off the transportation money from Dapeng Bay to Huiyang by the Japanese army, and seized a batch of military supplies and grain, and moved them into the Purple Mountain.
It is also said that after the defeat of the lone army, the 459th Brigade's rear road to retreat into Luofu Mountain had been blocked, and Zhong Fangjun contacted the General Headquarters of the 12th Group Army, hoping to continue to lead his troops to fight guerrillas in Luofu to slow down the japanese attack. However, this proposal was rejected by the commander-in-chief Yu Hanmou, who ordered Zhong Fangjun to immediately command the troops to break through. Zhong Fangjun was very depressed after receiving the telegram reply, and he felt that his troops were crushed by the Japanese army in less than a day, sorry for the country, even more ashamed of his father and elder in his hometown, thinking that he was ashamed and humiliated. The guards rushed forward to rescue him, but Zhong Fangjun eventually died of blood due to the fate of the key.
Zhong Fangjun's death shocked the whole army. The news reached Heyuan, and the county mourned. Heyuan County held a special memorial service at the County Martyrs' Shrine, at which someone wrote the following: "Swallowing the river, the Long Snake of the Japanese Kou was painfully injured; the bones of the loyal bones were left for a long time, and the spirits of all walks of life in the city were laid." ”
On November 16, 1943, Zhong Fangjun was admitted to the Martyrs' Shrine in the capital. The Chongqing Military Commission posthumously recognized Zhong Fangjun as a martyr and paid a pension. Yu Hanmou and Zhang Ruigui also paid pensions to Zhong Fangjun's widow in the name of their respective headquarters.
In May 1948, at the Tomb of the Martyrs of Skinny Dogling in the eastern suburbs of Guangzhou, a monument to the fallen soldiers of the Seventh Theater was erected, and Yu Hanmou, who was the commander of the Seventh Theater during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, personally wrote an inscription, which highlighted Zhong Fangjun: "Zhang Ruigui, commander of the 63rd Army, who also led the 153rd Division, was the first to fight; its brigade commander, Zhong Fangjun, was wounded and died; the officers and men of each regiment and battalion were killed and wounded as many as they were." ”
According to incomplete statistics, Zhong Fangjun was one of 271 Kuomintang generals (19 generals, 81 lieutenant generals, and 171 major generals) who died in the war during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression.
The tombstone of General Zhong Fangjun in Shiliu Mountain, Liangming Township, Liangkou District, Conghua County, Guangzhou
In the Cemetery of the 63rd Army of the Kuomintang Army in Conghua, Guangzhou, there is also a small stone stele with the words "Brigade Commander Fangjun" engraved on the stele, and the couplets of "Jing Loyal to serve the country and flow through the centuries" are engraved on both sides. In 1985, the Conghua government rebuilt the cemetery, specially invited Zhong Fangjun's children and relatives to attend the completion ceremony, and also included the cemetery in the county-level cultural relics protection unit and patriotic education base, and regularly worshiped and cleaned; in 2002, the martyrs' cemetery here was listed as a key cultural relics protection unit in Guangzhou.
On August 24, 2015, Zhong Fangjun was included in the second batch of 600 famous anti-war heroes and heroes released by the Ministry of Civil Affairs.
Reporter: Ling Li
Editor: Lin Zikai Proofreader: Huang Yongcong