Written by | Shassie
In June 1990, Marshal Xu Qianqian, who had been fighting all his life, was hospitalized due to illness, and Li Xiannian, a former old comrade-in-arms and old subordinate, who later once held a position that surpassed his, came to visit him. Xu Xiangqian knew that time was short, and looked at Li Xiannian and solemnly instructed: "My last words have three points: first, do not bid farewell to the body, second, do not hold a memorial service, and third, scatter the ashes on the Dabie Mountain, Daba Mountain, Taihang Mountain, and Hexi Corridor." ”
At that time, the older generation of revolutionaries were high-spirited and bright, and after their deaths, they did not want the state to be extravagant for them, so many leaders left their last words not to bid farewell to the remains and not to hold memorial services. However, Xu Xiangqian's third last words, which require him to scatter his ashes on the "Three Mountains and One Corridor" of the motherland (Dabie Mountain, Daba Mountain, Taihang Mountain and Hexi Corridor), have a very special significance.
On this point, Li Xiannian could not have been clearer in his heart, because the "Three Mountains and One Corridor" area basically witnessed Marshal Xu Qianqian's life of bloody struggle.
In June 1929, at the age of 28, Xu Xiangqian was ordered by the Central Military Commission to go to the northeast of Hubei to succeed Wu Guanghao, who had just died, as the commander of the Red 31st Division (first as deputy division commander).
This was the first time Xu Xiangqian came to the Dabie Mountain area, where he came to prominence and soon showed outstanding military talent, first as deputy commander of the Red First Army and commander of the Red First Division, then as chief of staff and commander of the Red Fourth Army, and finally as the commander-in-chief of the Red Fourth Front, one of the three main forces of the Red Army, and smashed the Kuomintang army's three "encirclement and suppression" of the Eyu-Anhui Soviet region.
The majestic Dabie Mountain not only witnessed Xu Xiangqian's excellent command ability, but also allowed him to harvest the second marriage in his life, but also left him with eternal pain.
The woman's name was Cheng Xunxuan. Decades later, Xu Xiangqian specifically recounted the incident in his memoirs, calling Cheng Xunxuan "my lover" to show his condolences to her.
Cheng Xunxuan is a native of Qiliping, Huang'an County (Hong'an County), Hubei Province. At that time, Qiliping was the center of the Eyu-Anhui Soviet, and when Xu Xiangqian first arrived, Dai Kemin, Cao Xuekai and others often took him with them to understand the local people's support for the Red Army, and thus became acquainted with Cheng Xunxuan.
Cheng Xunxuan came from a poor background, with 5 brothers and sisters, all of whom embarked on the road of revolution, she was the only girl in the family, ranking fourth.
In the winter of 1929, Dai Kemin, Cao Xuekai, and Ni Zhiliang saw that Xu Qianqian's first wife had died, and he was loyal, so they made a matchmaker for him and introduced the 18-year-old Cheng Xunxuan to him, and soon the two formed a revolutionary partner.
After the marriage, Xu Qianqian commanded the battle outside for many years, and Cheng Xunxuan asked to go to the front line with him in order to take care of his life, but Xu Xiangqian did not agree, but instead let her stay in the rear to organize and expand the Red Army propaganda team, replenish the Red Army's troop resources, and support the Red Army in combat. The two gathered less and rarely saw each other.
In November 1931, Xu Xiangqian was unfortunately wounded in the Battle of Huang'an, and when Cheng Xunxuan learned of this, he immediately rushed to the headquarters of the Red Fourth Front army on the front line and took good care of her husband. More than ten days later, Xu Xiangqian recovered from his injuries and continued to lead his army north, and Cheng Xunxuan said goodbye with tears, which was also the last time the two met.
In March of the following year, the Political Protection Bureau of the "anti-rebellion" organ of the Eyu-Anhui Soviet District came to Qiliping, arrested Cheng Xunxuan on the charge of "false accusations," imprisoned her for more than ten days, and tortured her to admit that her husband Xu Xiangqian was a "regrouped faction." However, Cheng Xunxuan gritted his teeth and did not say a word, and the security bureau became angry and secretly killed her in Heiwa. When Cheng Xunxuan died, he was only 21 years old, and he had not been married to Xu Xiangqian for three years.
When Cheng Xunxuan was killed, Xu Xiangqian was commanding the battle on the front line, he only knew that his wife had been captured, but there was no way to save her, let alone that she had already been killed. It was not until he arrived in Yan'an in 1937 that Xu Xiangqian finally knew that his wife had been sacrificed for 5 years. For this reason, Xu Xiangqian vowed not to marry a wife for the rest of his life.
In August 1932, Chiang Kai-shek gathered 300,000 people and made himself commander-in-chief to carry out the fourth major "encirclement and suppression" of the Eyu-Anhui Soviet Region. Zhang Guotao, the principal responsible person of the Eyu-Anhui Soviet Region, misestimated the situation and ordered the Red Fourth Front to continuously attack and confront the superior enemy, which finally led to the failure of the Fourth Anti-"Encirclement and Suppression" Operation of the Red Army, and was forced to withdraw from the Eyu-Anhui base area, crossing the DabaShan, crossing the Daba Mountain in the whole line, and coming to Tongjiang County, Sichuan, and creating the Sichuan-Shaanxi base area.
In the Sichuan-Shaanxi region around Daba Mountain, Xu Qiangqian commanded the Red Fourth Front to continue fighting, continuously defeating the Sichuan Army's "three-way siege" and "six-way attack", gradually gaining a firm foothold, and the Red Fourth Front army was also expanded to 5 corps, with a total strength of more than 80,000 people.
The continuous attacks of the Red Fourth Front in the DabaShan area not only severely frustrated the vigor of the Sichuan army, but also made Xu Xiangqian's excellent command ability famous all over the world, which made Chiang Kai-shek, who was far away in Nanjing, regret it.
It turned out that Chiang Kai-shek had always been complacent about being good at knowing and employing people, and boasted that he had never looked away. When Xu Xiangqian was at the Whampoa Military Academy, he was once called to the office by Chiang Kai-shek to ask questions.
Xu Xiangqian is shy, does not like to talk, and speaks a typical Shanxi accent, which makes Chiang Kai-shek sound very difficult. Moreover, Xu Xiangqian did not look like the kind of mighty soldier that Chiang Kai-shek liked in his heart, so without asking a few questions, Chiang Kai-shek waved his hand to let him out, and then said to his subordinates: "No! But no one expected that Xu Xiangqian, who was worthless in his eyes, not only beat him to the point of throwing away his armor in the Eyu-Anhui Su district, but also beat the Sichuan army to the Sichuan-Shaanxi region around the Daba Mountains.
In October 1934, the Central Red Army began the Long March. After the Red Fourth Front learned of this, in order to meet the Central Red Army and the Red Twenty-fifth Army, it crossed the Jialing River in the west, pinned down the main force of the Sichuan Army, and finally withdrew from the Sichuan-Shaanxi base area, and sent Li Xiannian west to Xiaojinchuan to occupy Maogong, and in June 1935, he met with the Central Red Army in victory.
After the two main forces of the Red Army met the division, the Central Revolutionary Military Commission issued an order in recognition of Xu Xiangqian's great merits in the Red Fourth Front, and specially awarded Xu Xiangqian a first-class Red Star Medal.
Soon, Zhang Guotao gave birth to another moth, refused to go north with the Central Red Army, announced the establishment of a separate central government, and finally at the unanimous request of Zhu De, Liu Bocheng, Xu Xiangqian, Chen Changhao, and others, Zhang Guotao had to agree to go north, and arrived in northern Shaanxi in October 1936.
At this time, Chiang Kai-shek had finished handling the Liangguang incident, freed his hands and formulated a new plan to suppress the Communists, ordering Hu Zongnan, Guan Linzheng, and others to attack the Red Army in northern Shaanxi. In order to break this situation, the Central Revolutionary Military Commission ordered the Red Fourth Front to organize the Western Route Army, cross the Yellow River, and implement the Ningxia Plan.
In November 1936, the Western Route Army was formally established, Xu was the former commander-in-chief, Chen Changhao was the political commissar, and Wang Shusheng was the deputy commander-in-chief, with the Fifth Army, the Ninth Army and the 30th Army under its jurisdiction, with more than 21,800 people in the whole army.
In Xu Xiangqian's mind, the Red Army's western expedition was a pain point that was unwilling to touch, and in just a few months, the Western Route Army was completely destroyed, and only Li Xiannian led a force of only 700 people to cross the Qilian Mountains and reach Xinjiang.
Xu went all the way to Pingliang, where he disguised himself, begged along the way, met Geng Biao, Liu Zhijian and others, then went to Yunyang, met Peng Dehuai and Zuo Quan, and finally returned to Yan'an from Xi'an. A large number of outstanding senior Red Army generals, such as Dong Zhentang and Sun Yuqing, fell forever on the Hexi Corridor.
Although these were not entirely Xu Xiangqian's responsibilities, he was still once grumpy and even ridiculed by some people, but Mao Zedong said to him: "Stay in the green mountains, and you are not afraid of running out of firewood." If you can come back, there are chickens and eggs. ”
In July 1937, the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression broke out in full swing. In August, the Red Army was reorganized into the Eighth Route Army of the National Revolutionary Army, and the 129th Division of the Eighth Route Army was established with the Fourth Army and the Thirty-first Army of the Red Fourth Front as the main force, with Liu Bocheng as the division commander and Xu as the former deputy division commander, and he returned to his own ranks again.
Soon, the 129th Division of the Eighth Route Army crossed the Yellow River in the east and marched to the anti-Japanese front in North China, quickly establishing an anti-Japanese base area relying on the Taihang Mountains and the Taiyue Mountains. In the eight-year War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the 129th Division of the Eighth Route Army annihilated more than 420,000 Japanese puppet troops, and the troops grew from more than 9,100 at the time of the expedition to nearly 300,000, becoming a strong force under the leadership of the Communist Party of China.
However, as early as 1939, Xu Xiangqian left the 129th Division of the Eighth Route Army, leaving the unit that had followed him for 10 years and was ordered to work in Shandong. In the following years, Xu Qianqian traveled from place to place until 1946, when he returned to the Taihang Mountains. Finally, in the Liberation War, several times defeated the strong with the weak, and led the army to defeat his Shanxi compatriot and the great warlord Yan Xishan.
In his decades of revolutionary career, Xu Xiangqian has never forgotten the landscapes and rivers of Dabie Mountain, Daba Mountain, Hexi Corridor and Taihang Mountain, nor can he forget the soldiers who fought with his own blood and conquered thousands of miles. In the end, his ashes were scattered in the land where he had once sprinkled his blood, and he was with his comrades-in-arms forever.
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