After the Outbreak of the Battle of Huaihai, first Huang Baitao's corps was annihilated by Huaye, and then the 120,000 horses of Huang Wei's corps fell into the siege of Nakano in Shuangduiji. In the face of the crisis, Du Yuming's heart was exhausted, he knew that at this time, the defeat of the Nationalist army had been decided, and if he insisted on fighting again, he could only destroy the entire army. Therefore, after obtaining the consent of Lao Jiang, Du Yuming led Qiu Qingquan, Li Mi and Sun Yuanliang, three corps of nearly 300,000 men and horses, to retreat from Xuzhou to Yongcheng, in a vain attempt to find a glimmer of life in the predicament.
Since it was a retreat, of course, there must be a rear troop, and Du Yuming gave the task of rear guard to Li Mi's 13th Corps after consideration. Li Mi graduated from the Huangpu Ivy, and he loved to play slippery when he started fighting, and Du Yuming knew this very well, so he repeatedly told Li Mi to put the overall situation first and effectively undertake the tasks behind the palace. Li Mi had promised very happily on the surface, but behind his back, he had already started the idea of escaping. At the beginning of the Battle of Huaihai, Huang Baitao personally rushed to Cao Baji to ask Li Mi to retreat with him, and the two corps rolled together toward Xuzhou, which was undoubtedly much safer than one corps alone.
However, Li Mi knew that Hua Ye was about to catch up, and delaying for a while would be more dangerous, so he rejected Huang Baitao's suggestion and ran away with the 13th Corps. Soon after, Huang Baitao was surrounded by Huaye in the Nianzhuang area, Li Mi and Qiu Qingquan were ordered to break the siege, and Li Mi, who had always slipped his head, took three steps back and two steps, and finally sat with Qiu Qingquan to watch Huang Baitao's army collapse. After receiving du Yuming's task of asking him to go behind the palace, Li Mi immediately summoned the commanders and division commanders to a meeting and asked all the units to advance lightly and run as fast as they could.
In this way, Li Mi's corps, which was supposed to be on the task of breaking the rear, ran to the front of Du Yuming's group and rushed the retreat sequence into a mess. Du Yuming was very angry when he learned of this situation, and called Li Mi to reprimand him fiercely. On December 3, 1948, the Du Yuming group, which had fled south, came to the area around Shancheng Ji and Honghe Ji. At this time, Lao Jiang sent a plane to airdrop a handwritten letter to Du Yuming, asking him to lead his troops back to rescue Huang Wei. Du Yuming believed that Lao Jiang was completely blind in command, but he did not dare to disobey the order, so he had to lead his troops back, and just after arriving at Chen Guanzhuang, he was chased and surrounded by Hua Ye.
The area around Chen Guanzhuang was small, and most of Du Yuming's nearly 300,000 men and horses had to sleep in the wilderness. It was a harsh winter, and with the combination of rain and snow, the soldiers were shivering one by one. Due to the siege, supplies could only be solved by airdrops. But the number of airdrops is very limited, and it is tantamount to a drop in the bucket for the 300,000 troops. In order to compete for a little food, many soldiers actually opened fire and their morale dropped to freezing.
In order to find a way to live for his 300,000 officers and men, Du Yuming planned to surrender to HuaYe, but was strongly opposed by Qiu Qingquan, and Du Yuming had to grit his teeth and brace himself in Chen Guanzhuang. On January 9, 1949, after more than 20 days of siege, Hua Ye launched a general attack on Du Yuming's group with ten columns. At this time, the Nationalist troops in the encirclement had long been demoralized, and the battle soon took on a one-sided posture. In the end, Qiu Qingquan was killed, Du Yuming was captured alive, and Sun Yuanliang escaped by chance.
After the war, Hua Ye cleaned up the battlefield and did not find Li Mi's figure among the captives. So where did this Li Mi go? It turned out that after Hua Ye launched a general attack, Li Mi changed into the clothes of a gangster and ran south with the defeated soldiers. He was also slightly injured during the melee. Early the next morning, Li Mi, who had fled to the Area of Zhangjiazhai, was captured by a squad of Huaye. At that time, Li Mi was 47 years old, and after a night of running away, he was tired and looked even older, and with the outfit of a man, the squad leader of our army credulously believed his words, thinking that he was really a man, so he gave him two oceans to let him go home.
When he fled to Gaojiazhai, Li Mi was helped by a landlord who made up a false identity for Li Mi and made up a road. In this way, Li Mi fled all the way south and finally ran back to Nanjing. Soon after, the 13th Corps was rebuilt, and Li Mi continued to serve as the commander of the corps. After Lu Han's uprising in Kunming, Li Mi fled with the remnants to northern Burma, and four years later to Taiwan. In 1973, Li Mi died at the age of 71.