Ye Zhanggen, a native of Kaihua, Zhejiang Province, was born in 1903 by his father as a sharecropper for the landlord's family, and his mother was in charge of household chores. In the blink of an eye, when he reached the age of school, because his family was poor, Ye Zhanggen could not afford to read, so he could only herd cattle for the landlord's family. When he grew up, he began to work odd jobs everywhere. At the age of 23, Ye Zhanggen worked as a porter for a landlord surnamed Chen, carrying a lot of goods to Guangdong, suffering hardships along the way, and was often scolded by the landlord.
After arriving at Shaoguan, just in time for the National Revolutionary Army to recruit soldiers, Ye Zhanggen enlisted in the army and was incorporated into the machine gun company of the thirteenth regiment of the Fifth Division of the Second Army of the National Revolutionary Army. Soon after, Ye Zhanggen followed the troops on the Northern Expedition, and was appointed deputy squad leader by the company commander for his heroic performance in the attack on Niutou Mountain. This company commander had read books and had a certain culture, thinking that the name Ye Zhanggen was not good, so he changed his name to Ye Changgeng in the name of the chang gung star in the sky. Later, Ye Changgeng made many meritorious contributions, and by 1929, he was already the platoon leader of the machine gun platoon.
In December of the same year, Ye Changgeng's unit was sent to fight the Red Army on the lonely river, and several defeated battles were fought in succession, and many people were captured by the Red Army. After these people returned, they all secretly said good things about the Red Army, saying that the Red Army was a team for the poor people to fight the world, and that officers and soldiers were equal, and that those who were officials did not scold soldiers, and that eating and wearing were the same as ordinary soldiers. Ye Changgeng was originally from a poor family, and when he first joined the National Revolutionary Army, he only wanted to have food to eat, and now he felt that the Red Army was the team he had always wanted to find.
Ye Changgeng was determined to join the Red Army, and secretly contacted a group of like-minded friends, and everyone was very happy when they heard that they were going to join the Red Army. In late December 1929, Ye Changgeng saw the opportunity and defected to the Red 5th Army with 22 soldiers and two heavy machine guns. At that time, the Red Army was very short of heavy weapons, and Peng Dehuai, commander of the Red 5 Army, was very happy to hear that Ye Changgeng had brought two heavy machine guns, personally received him, praised him, and made him the captain of the machine gun brigade.
After that, Ye Changgeng followed the troops to the south and the north, participated in many important battles and battles, and also served as the captain of the death squad during the second attack on Changsha. Because of his bravery in battle and good command, Ye Changgeng made rapid progress, successively serving as the commander of the Red 12th Division and the Red 22nd Division, and also acting as the chief of staff of the Xianggan Military Region. At that time, the political commissar of the military region was Gan Siqi, and Wang Zhen was the political commissar of the independent First Division under the jurisdiction of the military region. This shows how high Ye Changgeng's status was at that time.
After the start of the Long March, Ye Changgeng followed his troops to climb the snowy mountains and cross the meadows, during which he had two sudden malaria attacks, and finally completed the Long March with tenacious perseverance. After arriving in northern Shaanxi, Ye Changgeng recovered for a period of time due to the recurrence of old wounds during the Red Army period. After the outbreak of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Ye Changgeng served as deputy commander and chief of staff of the 4th Military Subdistrict of the Jin-Cha-Ji Military Region. During this period, his son Ye Guoqing was born, and due to the tense fighting, he could only be fostered in the home of a fellow villager in Zhaojiazhuang. Later, the Japanese army swept Zhao Jiazhuang, and his son, who was not yet 3 years old, was brutally killed by the enemy.
Ye Changgeng vented all the anger in his heart on the Japanese army, and in the Battle of Chenzhuang, under the command of He Long, Guan Xiangying, and Nie Rongzhen, together with his brother troops, he severely damaged the independent mixed 8th Brigade of the Japanese army that invaded our base area, killing and wounding more than 1,380 enemy prisoners. With his outstanding performance on the battlefield, Ye Changgeng attended the 7th Congress of the Communist Party of China as a representative of the Jin-Cha-Ji Military Region, which was a high honor at that time. After the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Ye Changgeng participated in the War of Liberation, first as the commander of the Heilongjiang Military Region, and in November 1948, he was transferred to the first deputy commander of the 50th Army.
During the Red Army period, he was the commander of the main division, and he was only promoted to deputy commander at the end of the Liberation War, that is to say, Ye Changgeng was only promoted to half a rank in the past ten years. In 1955, when the title was awarded, in the face of Ye Changgeng's situation, Luo Ronghuan, who was in charge of the evaluation of military ranks, made a mistake. When Ye Changgeng was the commander of the machine gun brigade of the Red 5 Army, the founding lieutenant general Gan Weihan was the squad leader under him; when Ye Changgeng was the acting chief of staff of the Xianggan Military Region, the founding general Wang Zhen was the political commissar of the independent First Division under the military region.
Judging from Ye Changgeng's seniority during the Red Army period and his contributions in the revolutionary war, it is not an exaggeration to appoint a lieutenant general. However, he was only a deputy commander at the end of the Liberation War, and according to the regulations, he could only be awarded major general. In the end, Luo Ronghuan personally found Ye Changgeng to talk to him and asked for his opinion on the award. Ye Changgeng said that he had never thought that he would one day become a general, and he was already very satisfied with the major general. Eventually he was awarded the rank of major general. In 1986, General Ye Changgeng died of illness at the age of 83.