My father's conquest years in the anti-Japanese and liberation battlefields
Author Pan Hongxing
During his father Pan Zishou's more than ten years of arduous war years, he worked and fought in a Red Army for ten years.
In May 1943, when the anti-Japanese pseudo-"sweeping" operation in Yanfu District of northern Jiangsu was still in the end, the Liandong Independent Regiment, a local unit of Yanfu at the time of his father's enlistment, received an order to re-enter the main force regiment at Funing Banhu, and the team was led by Wang Degui, political commissar of the Liandong Independent Regiment, into the 23rd Regiment of the 3rd Division, 8th Brigade of the New Fourth Army, with Wang Degui as the new political commissar of the 23rd Regiment, and the regimental commander was Hu Jicheng (Note 2), chief of staff of the 8th Brigade. As a veteran of the army for two years, his father was still a grain clerk in the grain depot of the 23rd Regiment Supply Department after joining the Liandong Independent Regiment.
In the past two years since joining the army, my father has participated in many battles and experienced the test of war, from soldiers, squad leaders, quartermaster clerks to grain clerks in the supply department, this time he was able to be incorporated into the 23rd Regiment of the 8th Brigade of the 3rd Division of the Famous New Fourth Army, and my father was very happy and proud.
Father during the War of Resistance Against Japan
The 23rd Regiment of the 8th Brigade of the 3rd Division of the New Fourth Army is a Red Army regiment that was fought from Eyuwan and originated in 1927 by Xu Haidong to lead the Peasants' Self-Defense Army in Hekou District, Huangpi County. By 1934, the Red 25th Army was part of the 225th Regiment of the Red 25th Army, and in 1936, during the Eastern Expedition to Shanxi, the Red 225th Regiment was expanded into the 75th Division of the Red 15th Army. The predecessor of his father's regiment was the 223rd Regiment of the Red 75th Division. When the Red Army reorganized the Eighth Route Army, this Red Army was downsized to 1 battalion of the 688th Regiment of the 344th Brigade of the 115th Division; when the Jiluyu Base Area was established at the end of 1938, it was expanded into the Special Service Regiment of the 344th Brigade of the 115th Division of the Eighth Route Army on the basis of the 1st Battalion and the local anti-Japanese armed forces, and the regimental level was restored.
In June 1940, within the formation of the 5th Column of the Eighth Route Army led by Huang Kecheng, the 5th Regiment of the 2nd Brigade went south to Yuwan and Su and east to Northern Jiangsu, and in October 1941 conquered Funing City and created the Yanfu Anti-Japanese Base Area in Northern Jiangsu, and this main force regiment has been active in his father's hometown of Lianshui and Funing in Jiangsu. After my father joined the army in 1941, his Liandong Independent Regiment often cooperated with this "Big Brother" regiment. The liandong independent regiment was enriched and strengthened by the 23rd regiment of the 8th Brigade, and my father worked and fought in this regiment for a full decade until he was transferred out of the regiment in 1952 on the battlefield of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea. He had a deep affection for this old team, and he remembered and remembered the old chiefs and old comrades of this regiment all his life, and regarded them as brothers in the same trench. His father was also trained, tested, promoted and promoted in the Red Army, and held positions in several important departments of the regiment.
Officers and men of the Eighth Route Army in training
Photo of the command post of the 23rd Regiment of the Coastal Military Region in November 1943 when the Battle of Ganyu was launched.
In October 1943, the 23rd Regiment of the 8th Brigade of the 3rd Division of the New Fourth Army was ordered to be transferred to Shandong and incorporated into the Shandong Coastal Military Region of the Eighth Route Army, renamed the 23rd Regiment of the Coastal Military Region of the Eighth Route Army. Less than half a year after his father joined the 23rd Regiment with the Liandong Independent Regiment, he was about to leave his hometown and go north to Shandong. He did not flinch in the slightest, and firmly followed the troops on the journey north. The troops set out from Funing Banhu Lake, crossed the Longhai Road from Baitabu via Xiangshui and Guanyun, and arrived in the Linshu Mountains of Shandong Province, where their main activities were in linshu, Ganyu, Juxian and Rizhao, and they were one of the four main regiments of the Coastal Military Region. The first battle of the 23rd Regiment into Lulu, the battle to conquer Ganyu City, made a good start with one shot, and was commended by the head of the Shandong Military Region.
His father's regiment fought in the coastal area of Shandong until the surrender of the Japanese devils in 1945 until the end of the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japan. During this period, my father had been working in the supply department of the 23rd Regiment of the Coastal Military Region as a grain and military supply worker. In 1943, when he launched large-scale production, he was sent to the Yellow Sea in Ganyu County to open a salt flat, and was praised for his good completion of the salt production task. As an ordinary soldier on the logistics front, he made his own contribution to the victory of the War of Resistance against the Japanese puppet army, the liberation of the fallen land, and he was awarded an independence freedom medal after the founding of the People's Republic of China!
The father received the Independence Freedom Medal and Certificate
In August 1945, the 23rd Regiment of the Coastal Military Region was renamed the 5th Regiment of the 2nd Division of the Shandong People's Liberation Army, and launched a final counterattack against the Japanese puppet army, fighting in the vast urban and rural areas from Longhai Road to Jiaoji Road, and fiercely attacking the Japanese puppet army that refused to surrender. In October of that year, the 5th Regiment suddenly received orders to advance to the northeast, set out from Tancheng, Shandong Province, within the formation of the 2nd Division of Shandong, and boarded the ship at Luanjiakou in HuangXian County, Jiaodong Peninsula.
At that time, the father stayed alone in the rear to deal with the remains of the expulsion, and it took several days to chase the troops. At that time, the War of Resistance had been victorious, and my father had not returned home for several years, and he missed his parents and siblings far away. Advancing into the northeast and going farther and farther, will it go south as a deserter to return home, or will it go north to continue to work with the troops? The father did not hesitate to chase the troops all night, and when the ferry was finally boarded, Wang Zhijia (Note 3), director of the regiment's political office, was surprised to see his father who was a dusty servant and tired, and he patted his father lovingly and said, "Good boy! Don't come and think you're running home, good look! Father said: "The revolution is not over, let's go to the northeast and look at 'upstairs and downstairs, electric lights and telephones'!" "After passing the little test, my father's determination to do revolution in the army has become even stronger!"
Originally, the news was that the northeast was full of guns and cannons dropped by the devils, and when starting from Shandong, the whole regiment kept only one gun per squad, each company left a light machine gun, and the rest of the guns were left to the Shandong troops. The 5th Regiment landed in Zhuanghe County, on the Liaodong Peninsula, in the 2nd Division, and it was not until Liaoyang that it received a batch of weapons left over from the Surrender of the Japanese Army, and then combined the Xinmin County Security Brigade with full guns and live ammunition, basically restoring the combat effectiveness of one person and one shot.
In Beizhen, Liaoning, the 5th Regiment of the 2nd Division of Shandong, where my father belonged, fought for the first time with the well-equipped Kuomintang Ace Army of American Weapons, and due to the error in the judgment of the superiors on the enemy's situation, the battle was unexpected, and before the all-round attack could begin, the area around Beizhen was heavily surrounded by the enemy, and the danger was suddenly fraught with danger. The 5th Regiment, under the command of regimental commander Ye Jianmin (Note 4) and political commissar Li Xinmin (Note 5), handled it properly, and although the troops suffered losses, they were still able to break through from the encirclement of an enemy army seven times larger than themselves. Father recalled: At that time, the situation was extremely urgent, the outside of the north town had already started, the gunfire was dense in all directions, he did not receive the order to retreat, the situation was unknown, still stuck to the post, a fellow came to remind him kindly: Why don't you run! The "national army" has entered the city gate! As soon as the father heard the leg, he ran, and rushed out of the city with a smoke and climbed up the back hill, and the enemy's bullets also chased after him, and he was almost captured. This time, the North Town broke through, and all the shandong units of the Eighth Route Army, which had just left the customs, suffered losses. The brotherhood suffered even greater losses, and the regimental commissar was captured by the enemy. At that time, due to the lack of a solid base area in the northeast, the troops could not stand up and withdrew all the way to the north.
Father with his comrades after the victory of the War of Resistance (right stand)
Under the direct command of the Headquarters of the Northeast Democratic Coalition Army and Commander Lin Biao, the 1st and 2nd Divisions of Shandong Directly Under the Headquarters of the Democratic Coalition Army were the main offensive forces (the 5th Regiment was formed), and in April 1946, the first turnaround battle was fought in the area of Wickergou and Xinglongling, and the arrogant Kuomintang ace army was the first to be created, fiercely defeating the arrogance of the enemy for a while, and the enemy's offensive was only slightly slowed down.
The 5th Regiment of the 2nd Division of the Northeast Democratic Coalition Army, where my father belonged, participated in the brutal and bloody Siping Defense Battle (Siping in World War II), and after the war, the troops once again retreated to the area around the Jiaohe River in Jilin for a short rest. During this period, his father, as a quartermaster of the Supply Department of the 5th Regiment, together with Wang Zhijia, director of the Political Department of the Regiment, seized the opportunity in the new district to raise a large amount of grain cloth and solve the urgent need for the troops to be loaded and grain materials. The operation and his name are recorded on page 138 of the History of the 338th Infantry Regiment – The Glorious Team.
In August 1946, my father was promoted to deputy chief of the production unit of the Supply Department of the 5th Regiment. My father recalled: "At that time, I was responsible for opening a small trading shop in the rear of Harbin and running a small cigarette workshop, which was located three streets outside Harbin Road. In February 1947, my father was promoted to head of the production unit. In the base area of Northern Manchuria, he led the rear personnel to carry out self-reliant production and operation, opened cigarette workshops, engaged in transportation, and did economic and trade work, and did everything possible to continuously provide grain, oil, money, and various logistical materials to the front troops. In July of that year, he was transferred back to the front and transferred to the head of the grain and straw unit of the regimental supply department, and was promoted to deputy director of the supply department in May 1948. In the past two years, it was precisely the northeast battlefield that was getting bigger and bigger, and the war in our army was getting stronger and stronger, and the 5th regiment of the 2nd Division to which my father belonged participated in the "Three Lower Jiangnan", the Dawa Pursuit Battle, the Siping Offensive (Three Battles and Four Pings), the Autumn Offensive, the Winter Offensive, and the Capture of Siping (Four Battles and Four Pings), until the Liaoshen Campaign that liberated the whole northeast.
Father in the northeast with comrades in arms (right stand)
On the eve of the Liaoshen Campaign, my father took up the post of deputy director of the Supply Department of the 5th Regiment, and went all out to do a good job in logistical support for the upcoming Northeast Decisive Battle, from the new type of army of Karen's "three checks and five rectifications", to the south of the Beining Line, the encirclement and annihilation of Liao Yaoxiang's corps, until finally conquering Shenyang and liberating the entire northeast territory. My father fought in the logistics post of the 2nd Division and the 5th Regiment, and worked diligently for the victory of the front line, making meritorious contributions to the cause of the liberation of the Chinese people.
In November 1948, the whole army was unified, and the new name of his father's regiment was: 338 Regiment of the 113th Division of the 38th Army of the Chinese People's Liberation Army. In December 1948, the four million troops entered the customs and marched south for 25 days, and the supply department of the 338 regiment led by his father was awarded the honorary title of "Consolidating The Model Three Good Units" by the head of the army.
On the eve of the Pingjin Campaign in Tianjin in November 1948, the 338th Regiment assembled near Yang Liuqing, and his father approached Yang Guanwu, the regiment's political commissar, and asked him to change his career and stop doing logistics. Upon the decision of the Party Committee of the Regiment, he was appointed as the chief of the management unit of the 338 Regiment Headquarters, leading the directly subordinate units and miscellaneous personnel of the regimental headquarters organs, and also responsible for the various duties of the regimental leadership. The personnel of the units directly under the regiment were difficult to manage and complicated affairs, and my father set an example by quickly straightening out the relations, strengthening management, and renewing the style of the organs, units, and personnel of the regimental headquarters, and then in major battles and combat operations such as conquering Tianjin and marching south, the organs and units of the 338 regiment headquarters coordinated and worked together to assist the regimental commander in commanding and operating to fight a series of victorious battles.
In April 1949, Chairman Mao and Commander-in-Chief Zhu issued the "Order for a Great March to the Whole Country", and the 338th Regiment set out from Yongqing County, Hebei Province, within the formation of the military division, and advanced thousands of miles through the provinces of Hebei, Lu, Henan, and Hubei to Zaoyang, Hubei Province. On the eve of the battle to cross the Yangtze River, in May 1949, my father was once again reassigned to the position of chief of the platoon unit of the 338 regiment headquarters, and the platoon unit is now called the military affairs unit, which is responsible for the strength of the regiment's military establishment and equipment, the garrison guards, military discipline, discipline, picketing of discipline, internal affairs and hygiene, etc. Under the leadership of Yan Yongrang (Note 6), the regimental chief of staff, the department that implements the administrative management of the whole regiment , and another big butler role.
Father, the great steward, was expanded from the regimental headquarters to the whole regiment. Although he could not lead his troops to fight, he worked conscientiously in his new post, experienced the Battle of Yisha, the Siege and Annihilation of Huaqiao in Xiangxi, the Yuemiao Ridge, and the roundabout operation of advancing into Guangxi, and together with the commanders and fighters of the whole regiment, crushed the enemy's attempt to escape from Hainan and abroad. In the continuous march and combat in the southwest of the great southwest, the military affairs work of the whole regiment under the leadership of his father achieved excellent results, and he urged the officers and men of the whole regiment to strictly abide by the three major disciplines and eight points of attention, safeguard the interests of the people of all nationalities in the southwest, abide by discipline and law, and do not commit any crimes in the autumn. In November 1949, when he was evaluating his merits, he was once again given a small personal merit by the Party Committee of the 113th Division for his ability to endure hardships, unite well, and abide by discipline.
On December 5, 1949, the 338th Regiment fought all the way to Du'an, Guangxi Province, within the division formation. The 38th Army's Four Wild Iron Stream Divisions swept the Southwest Miaoling Mountains from the White Mountains and Black Waters, destroying the decay and overwhelming force along the way, and seizing most of the country and mountains ruled by the Kuomintang reactionaries.
At the end of February 1950, the 38th Army, as one of the national defense mobile units, returned to Henan to train and produce at the same time. The 338 regiment was stationed in Luoshan County, Xinyang District, Henan, at this time, the father's position was transferred again, and Liao Shaoqing, the former director of the regiment's supply department, was drawn to Beijing to participate in the preparatory work for the establishment of the Government Council. In March 1950, his father was transferred to the post of chief of the supply department of the 338th Regiment. In the three years of the Liberation War, his father survived the battlefield of blood and fire and made his own contribution to the establishment of new China, and was awarded the Third Class Liberation Medal after the founding of the People's Republic of China.
The commanders and fighters of the People's Liberation Army were bravely pursuing the enemy
Father was awarded the Order of Liberation of the Third Degree and certificate
Mother Yang Tingzhang (left) 16 years old as a soldier and comrade-in-arms group photo
In March 1950, his mother Yang Tingzhang and a group of other knowledgeable young people graduated from the 38th Army Military and Political Cadre School and were assigned to the 338th Regiment, and their mother worked as an accountant in the financial unit of the regiment supply department led by her father.
On June 25, 1950, the Korean Civil War broke out, and the 338th Regiment was ordered to be included in the northeast border defense army in the formation of the military division, and in July of that year, it went north to Liaoning to assemble to defend the northeast border defense of the motherland, and if necessary, went to Korea to participate in the war. After arriving in the northeast, the 338th Regiment was stationed in Kaiyuan, Liaoning Province, and in September the whole regiment carried out surprise pre-war training, adjusted the organizational structure and technical equipment of the troops, streamlined the logistics organization according to the needs of the war, merged the regimental health team with the supply department, and established the 338 regiment logistics department, and the father was the first director (director) of the logistics department of the 338 regiment.
On October 20, 1950, within the formation of the army and division, the 338th Regiment entered the Sino-North Korean border by train from Kaiyuan and crossed the Yalu River from Ji'an (present-day Ji'an) on October 22. When he went abroad, there were more than 3,200 officers and men of the regiment, including Zhu Yuehua (Note 7), political commissar Xing Ze (Note 8), deputy regimental commander Xie Chunlin, chief of staff Hu Guang, director of the Political Department Cui Pu, and director of the Logistics Department Pan Zishou. The 338th Regiment, the main force of the Siye 1 Column, was one of the first teams to gloriously participate in the great War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea and go abroad to fight, and later achieved world-famous heroic achievements!
The 338th Regiment of the 13th Division of the 38th Army was the first to enter the Korean War and cross the Yalu River
Note 1: Wang Degui, a major general in 55 years, finally served as deputy commander of the Air Force of the Wuhan Military Region.
Note 2: Hu Jicheng, a major general in 55 years, finally served as deputy political commissar of the Chengdu Military Region.
Note 3: Wang Zijia, who finally served as the deputy director of the General Office of the Second Machine Department.
Note 4: Ye Jianmin, a major general in 55 years, finally served as deputy commander of the Guangzhou Military Region.
Note 5: Li Xinmin, a major general in 1964, finally served as deputy political commissar of the Logistics Department of the Guangzhou Military Region.
Note 6: Yan Yongrang, who eventually served as deputy chief of staff of the Second Artillery Corps.
Note 7: Zhu Yuehua was finally appointed deputy commander of the Guangzhou Military Region.
Note 8: Xing Ze finally served as the director of the Political Department of the Logistics College of the Central Military Commission.
Author's resume: Pan Hongxing, who enlisted in the 338 Regiment in 1969, served as an officer of the Propaganda Unit of the Regiment's Political Department, served as a reporter and editor in the Military Department of the Central People's Radio in 1980, a news unit directly under the Political Department of the General Political Department, joined the preparatory group of Phoenix Satellite TV in 1995, and went to Hong Kong in 1996 to serve in Phoenix Satellite TV: chief judge, chief editor, deputy director, and director of the chief editor's office. His father, Pan Zishou, a native of Lianshui, Jiangsu Province, joined the army in 1941, and in 1943 was incorporated into the 23rd Regiment of the 338th Regiment, the predecessor of the 3rd Regiment, the 3rd Division, the 3rd Division, and the 38th Army after graduating from the Wuchang Advanced Artillery School in 1955. He successively served as the chief of the logistics department of the 338th Regiment and the chief of the Ordnance Section of the Military Logistics Department.