"Our country, and our nation of five thousand years of history, will never perish at the hands of the slaves of the three islands."
In May 1940, on the front line of the Battle of Zaoyi, Zhang Zizhong wrote this letter to his subordinate Feng Zhi'an, and immediately after that, he personally led his troops across the river and engaged in a nearly ten-day battle with the Japanese army at that time.
Due to the huge disparity in strength, Zhang Zizhong eventually died heroically.
The sacrifice of this 49-year-old patriotic anti-Japanese general has caused mourning throughout the country. On May 23, his coffin was escorted by 100,000 people, and Japanese warplanes stopped dropping bombs.
What kind of person is Zhang Zizhong? Why did the people, the Kuomintang generals, and the Japanese army attach so much importance to him?
In May 1940, the Japanese army gathered 300,000 troops to launch the Battle of Zaoyi.
Zhang Zizhong decided to personally lead his troops to a decisive battle with the Japanese army.
After fierce fighting, Zhang Zizhong was shot in the left shoulder and had other wounds on his body, but he forced himself to write the last report and said
"I fought and died, and I asked myself whether I was worthy of the country and the nation."
Zhang Zizhong had been wounded twice at this time, and when he was bandaging the second wound, the enemy bullet pierced his chest again, until he was killed by a total of 7 bullets.
"In a high position, but can live and die with the soldiers; the back road is calm, but half a step does not retreat to hold the will of death"
Zhang Zizhong's fighting spirit of not being afraid of life and death won the respect of his opponents, and the Japanese army collected his body and buried him in a coffin, spreading the news of his death in the form of a noon broadcast in the army, praising his fearless spirit.
Zhang Zizhong's men also responded in time after grief, launched a fierce charge against the Japanese troops, and finally successfully recovered Zhang Zizhong's body and directly escorted him back to the Chongqing area, where Chiang Kai-shek led the senior Kuomintang officials to prepare a funeral for him.
When the convoy of guardians passed through Yichang, hundreds of thousands of people spontaneously walked out of their homes to send Zhang Zizhong off, and even though the Japanese planes had circled the sky several times, the masses were still silent and fearless.
The Japanese planes also seemed to be so intimidated by this that after passing over the coffin for the third time, they did not drop a single shell and, rarely, did not cause any casualties to the population.
Zhang Zizhong was from a former Qing official eunuch family
"Noble Prince"
He is also determined to devote himself to saving the country
"Revolutionary"
。
In 1891, Zhang Zizhong was born in a family of eunuchs in Linqing, Shandong, and because his father was once an official to Wupin, his juvenile life was relatively generous and could be called worthy of the name
。 Of course, good family conditions did not make him breed many feudal bad habits, but made him a young man with a strong temperament and a sense of justice, and the books he loved to read since childhood, such as "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" and "Yue Fei's Biography", also cultivated his extremely strong patriotic feelings.
In 1911, the Xinhai Revolution officially broke out, and Zhang Zizhong was also admitted to the Beiyang Law and Politics School and came into contact with Dr. Sun Yat-sen's Three People's Principles.
The deafening new ideas took root in his heart and eventually set Zhang Zizhong on the path of vigorous democratic revolution.
After graduating from the Beiyang School of Law and Politics, Zhang Zizhong entered Feng Yuxiang's unit, starting from the grassroots level, step by step from platoon commander to the position of commander of the 38th Division of the 29th Army of the Revolutionary Army, and he also officially gained a firm foothold in the "Northwest Army" and enthusiastically wanted to realize his patriotic ideals and ambitions.
However, the 46-year-old Zhang Zizhong did not expect that he would not become like Yue Fei
"Hero"
, instead became one
"Traitor".
On July 7, 1937, the July 7 Incident officially broke out, and the Japanese army began to move towards Beiping on a large scale, and the generals in charge of the Pingjin area at that time were Song Zheyuan and Zhang Zizhong.
Seeing the large-scale approach of the Japanese army, Song Zheyuan was instigated and said on his lips
"Leave a little foundation for the Northwest Army"
In fact, it was to retreat with a large army, leaving Zhang Zizhong with a mess.
And what Zhang Zizhong did at this time was all wrong--if he resisted stubbornly, the unit under his command alone would not be able to lift the wind at all, and it would easily provoke the Japanese army and make Beiping a tragedy; if he did not resist, once the Japanese army entered Beiping, his traitor hat would be solid.
After some thought, Zhang Zizhong finally ordered Shi Zhengang, Ruan Xuanwu and others who remained in the city that they should not attack if they stayed in the city, and if they were necessary, they should disarm and not start a war in Peiping.
In fact, at this time, Zhang Zizhong still had illusions in his heart, hoping that the Japanese army would not enter the city.
However, in the end, the Japanese army still marched into Beiping, and his subordinate Shi Zhengang did not heed the order to disarm and directly led the troops to break through.
After the news of the fall of the Pingjin area and Zhang Zizhong's order not to resist spread, public opinion exploded throughout the country, and for a time Zhang Guozhong became the biggest traitor in the eyes of the people, and everyone began to curse at him, but he himself could only be silent.
He had no way to reveal to the outside world that he had only been left behind by Song Zheyuan to clean up the mess
"Abandoned Son"
There is no way to explain his unwillingness to escalate the conflict and can only hope that Japan will return Peiping.
And forced him to be this
"Traitor"
And why not just Song Zheyuan? Japan has long wondered how long it has been laid out and how many rumors have been secretly spread.
As early as before the July 7 Incident, Ishigaki proposed to study the Soviet Union's five-year plan, not only not to expand into Kannai, but also to conduct harmonious exchanges with the 29th Army, and invited Song Zheyuan to visit Japan. It was naturally good to be able to alleviate the situation, so Song Zheyuan sent Zhang Zizhong to Japan, but who ever thought that this was also another Japanese conspiracy.
After Zhang Zizhong arrived in Japan, the Japanese side began to create a frenzied campaign and hyped up Zhang Zizhong.com
"Pro-Japan"
The image, in the course of the subsequent confrontation, can even require the troops to fight
"Don't fight Zhang Zizhong's troops"
Under the banner of madness, it can be described as madness. Although these acts did not cause too bad an impact at that time, they actually became Zhang Zizhongdang later
target
"Corroborative evidence".
The cries of the people became a boulder in his heart, and the repression of silence eventually prompted him to complete his awakening.
Zhang Zizhong, who had been dismissed from his post, wrote a blood letter to Chiang Kai-shek, bluntly saying that he hoped to lead troops to resist Japan. Li Zongren, Cheng Qian, and others strongly recommended him after seeing his determination, which eventually prompted Chiang Kai-shek to re-recruit Zhang Zizhong as the acting commander of the 59th Army under the tense situation of the Kuomintang generals.
The Defense of Linyi began, and Zhang Zizhong, who was bent on serving the country, abandoned his old grudge with Pang Bingxun and began to support the Third Army.
Under the complicated situation at that time, Zhang Zizhong did not directly support himself, but instead took a roundabout attack
"Wei Wei saves Zhao"
Directly leading the troops to start a surprise attack on the Japanese army in the Liujiahu area, directly interrupting the Japanese offensive from the flank and back, the two sides launched a fierce war, killing more than 6,000 people in just three days.
At that time, the Kuomintang side wanted to withdraw Zhang Zizhong's troops, but Zhang Zizhong did not retreat one step at a time, and was bound to take the opportunity to hurt the Japanese army.
General Zhang Zizhong's performance in the war initially cleared the people's misunderstanding of him, but he did not slacken off at all, but instead more actively threw himself into the confrontation with the Japanese army.
In May 1940, the Battle of Zaoyi officially began, and Zhang Zizhong was the commander of the Kuomintang at that time.
In the case of Tang Enbo retreating without a fight and Huang Qixiang unable to support him, Zhang Zizhong was already facing an absolute disadvantage in terms of troop strength, but General Zhang Zizhong could be said to have taken half a step in order to buy time for the rest of the troops and to complete the tasks assigned to him by the Kuomintang.
What if the 440th and 444th regiments that went to intercept them suffered heavy casualties and could not continue?
Zhang Zizhong directly sent out his own guards, leaving only a few people responsible for assisting him in his command, and in the end he even went to the front line.
At that time, the Japanese army and some data recorded the scene of Zhang Zizhong's heroic sacrifice, and Fujioka, the first class soldier of the fourth team of the Japanese army, was the first to rush to the front.
Suddenly, he saw a tall officer standing up from a pool of blood, and the majestic gaze forced Fujioka not to have the courage to take a step earlier.
Even though he was hit in the head by a bullet from the Japanese army behind him, he still stood tall.
At this time, Fujioka also shook his head, and stabbed him with all his strength with his bayonet, before he fell to the ground.
After Zhang Zizhong's sacrifice, he had a Parker gold pen in his left chest pocket, which was engraved on it
"Zhang Zizhong"
Three words.
The Japanese officer also discovered that the standing officer turned out to be Zhang Zizhong, and immediately performed a military salute to his body, and also ordered the military doctor to scrub Zhang Zizhong's body with alcohol and bury it in the coffin.
In fact, there has been
"Anti-Chiang Kai-shek"
History of General Zhang Zizhong, with
"Feng Yuxiang"
、
"Yang Hucheng"
Like others, he did not receive so much attention from Chiang Kai-shek, and he himself had many dissatisfaction with the shortcomings of the Kuomintang and his attitude toward our Party was relatively friendly.
In the course of Zhang Zizhong's leading troops to fight, officials from Chongqing once talked to him, and when they talked about the New Fourth Army's Yu'e advancing column, they were dismissive, believing that this was an "illegal war of resistance." At that time, Zhang Zizhong was furious and went back.
"What is the illegal war of resistance? They also eliminated a great number of puppet armies in the rear of the enemy and contributed to the War of Resistance. Moreover, they also set up various anti-Japanese groups, organized the common people, and sent us a large number of Japanese prisoners. If so, then what is legal? ”
Officials from Chongqing were dumbfounded and eventually had to go away in sorrow, and the order to ask General Zhang Zizhong to strike at the New Fourth Army was naturally ignored by him.
In Zhang Zizhong's view, as long as he participates in the revolution, he should establish a united front, and he should unanimously attack the Japanese with the muzzle of his guns to the outside world, rather than engaging in nest fighting, so he is not very accustomed to Chiang Kai-shek's ideas.
In addition, Zhang Zizhong once personally said a word to his subordinate Li Jiusi
"The Kuomintang troops corrupted individuals to preserve their strength, not really fight the Japanese"
It is clear that Zhang Zizhong was suspicious of the purity of Chiang Kai-shek's resistance to Japan and was worried about the many factional struggles in the Kuomintang.
Premier Zhou also called Zhang Zizhong,
"His loyalty and righteousness, his magnificent spirit, are only suspected to be the soul of the mainland anti-war soldiers"
Highly rated.
However, a sentence from the reporter of Xinhua Daily is more appropriate -
"Although General Zhang Zizhong is dead, he is still alive in the hearts of the soldiers."