In early 1931, I was serving as a company commander in the 27th Regiment of the 9th Division of the 3rd Red Army in Western Hunan Province, and in the battle for the concave, I was wounded in my right leg, and my entire leg was swollen, the wound was inflamed, and I could not move.
The organization decided to leave me in a village about twenty miles away from the town of Tawo in Yongshun County, Xiangxi Province.
With me, there were three other comrades left: Liu Yuesheng, the youth officer of our regiment, and Tang Jinlong and Li Wenqing, the two battalion commanders of the Fourth Division.
"With us, there are you!" This is what our fellow villagers often say to us.
Twenty days have passed. Under the meticulous care of our fellow villagers, all four of us, except for Comrade Tang Jinlong, had healed our wounds. So we decided to go and look for troops right away!
However, the four townships are armed with landlords, what should we do if we encounter them? Besides, Tang Jinlong is not yet well, how can we leave our comrades-in-arms?
Finally, I thought of a way, and we decided to disguise ourselves as white troops, carry Tang Jinlong on a stretcher, and pass under the eyes of the enemy. The troops were originally moving westward, and they would always find it, and if they couldn't find it, they would go deep into the mountains to fight guerrillas.
Early the next morning, we set off with the dry food prepared for us by our fellow villagers.
We walked in the direction of Yongshun and Baojing in Xiangxi. I dressed up as the enemy's "avant-garde adjutant" and walked ahead. Fortunately, there was also a previously captured Yellow Tweed Army coat, which was now used.
Passing by, people really thought that we were the White Army, and several times we encountered the landlords' armed forces, and they were all mixed up. When they interrogated them, we said a few perfunctory words, asked more questions, and then we lost our temper and walked away with a big swing.
In this way, although we were safe, we also brought suffering: the masses did not approach us, and when they saw us, they looked at us with hatred and avoided them, and if they asked them for some news of the Red Army, they shook their heads even more.
One day, the sun had just set, and we arrived at a village, planning to take a break and ask for directions before walking. Just in time, a few young people, barefoot and carrying flat burdens, walked outside the village, but as soon as they saw us, they immediately tensed up, turned their heads, and went around a few houses and disappeared.
We found a lonely old man at the west end of the village, and as soon as he entered the door, he repeatedly said to us, "Commander! You should go to the temple ancestral hall, it's so dirty! ”
We understood that he did not want to take us in, and our hearts were really unhappy, and I also remembered one thing during the day: in the morning, it was easy to find a guide, but only led us for four or five miles, so I said that I wanted to urinate and slipped away.
Dressing up as a white army, it is really difficult to move. I really wanted to immediately unveil this temporary outfit and return my true face, but for safety, in order to catch up with the troops, I suppressed the violent impulse several times.
We finally arrived in Yongshun County and settled down in a small village. Our fellow villager was a poor peasant, a family of five or six, four dilapidated houses, two in front and two in the back, and a narrow courtyard in the middle.
When we first arrived, there were still the cries of children, the rebuke of adults, and the movement of people in the yard from time to time.
But as soon as we settled down, everything disappeared, and only one man in his forties— about a parent— came forward to talk to us coldly. We were going to cook, there was no water in the jar, I wanted to borrow a bucket to use, the fellow took it out for half a day, and there was a deliberate collision, and the bucket was thrown in front of us; I wanted to find the dishes and chopsticks, but the cupboard was empty, and there was nothing.
We borrowed it from him, and he said indignantly, "Didn't you all ruin it the other day?" Where else! ”
Hearing this, I was confused for a moment, but then I understood it - "White Army"!
It turned out that the other day, the White Army had come here and ruined the village.
The indifference and hostility of the villagers make us feel embarrassed on the surface, but in our hearts we are extremely happy. From here, we have seen the people's hearts turned against us, further appreciated the justice of the revolutionary cause, and listened to the indignant accusations of our fellow villagers, which has further strengthened our trust and respect for them.
With this in mind, we decided to explain our identities and inquire about the whereabouts of the troops.
After dinner, we invited our fellow villagers into our house. He sat cramped in the middle, and we took out a copper circle and asked him to accept it, indicating that it was the cost of firewood for cooking.
He accepted it, and then we talked to him.
"Fellow countrymen, have you ever had any Red Army here?"
"Have been here."
"What about the National Army?"
"I've been here too, and I only left a few days ago."
"Fellow countrymen, do you think the Red Army is good or the National Army is good?"
He "hmmmed" for a while and replied, "We are farmers, no matter who is good or who is bad." ”
We asked about his family's life, and although he was cautious, he was "set" out.
His family originally had only three acres of land, and had just been divided into seven acres in the land struggle, and now they were occupied by the landlords. Knowing this, we told him the words that had been hidden in our hearts for several days: "Fellow! Do you really think we're white soldiers? ”
This sudden questioning made him stunned, and his eyes widened, staring at us.
"No, we are the Red Army!"
He froze, his face flushed, as if he wanted to say something, but he immediately calmed down and fell silent—at that time, in Xiang'echuanqian, there were often white troops pretending to be red army, spying on military intelligence and carrying out other sabotage activities, which could not help but make him vigilant.
"We were wounded, we just recovered, and now we're looking for troops."
"Fellow! Do you know where the Red Army is now? ”
We told him again and again, confirmed to him that we were the Red Army, but he remained confused and silent, his eyes looking at the ground, and from time to time he secretly glanced at us.
The wind kept blowing through the crack in the door, and the cabin became silent again.
We thought that after telling the truth, the fellow villagers would be happy, but it did not go so smoothly.
After a moment of silence, he suddenly stood up and said, "We farmers, regardless of the Red Army, the White Army!" ”
He tensed his face and said he was sleepy, it was not early, and he was going to sleep. This really makes us feel embarrassed, how can we make the problem clear?
We had to kindly and patiently ask him to sit down again, and said:
"Fellow countrymen, we are really the Red Army!"
He reluctantly sat down again. We undressed to reveal our freshly healed wounds, pointed to the stretcher on the side, and told the story in detail.
He still did not speak, but his eyes looked at us repeatedly, as if to distinguish between our faces and whether we were the Red Army or the White Army?
Suddenly, he turned his face to stare at my simple package. I don't know when the package opened its mouth, revealing a Red Army octagonal hat inside.
Seeing this, his eyes lit up, and he finally cried, "Comrade! You are really the Red Army! ”
He hurried out and brought in his son, daughter-in-law, and children. In an instant, the hut was filled with a cheerful atmosphere, and the adults were busy apologizing, greeting us on the road, and telling the crimes of the White Army that had come to ravage after the Red Army had left.
The child also climbed on top of us and called out affectionately "Uncle! "Although we have already eaten, the old woman must go to the fire and get some "snacks" to entertain us. Only then, she said, could she be at ease. We felt warm in our hearts and felt that the villagers were really the relatives of the Red Army.
Then the compatriots excitedly told us that our troops were stationed in Maoba, not far to the west, only fifty miles away from here, and had just crushed the Fifty-first Division of the Kuomintang. It was also he who enthusiastically delivered a letter for us to Maoba that night.
The next afternoon, with the help of our fellow countrymen, we finally returned to the army.
Comrade Zhang Xiulong Profile: Born in 1915, a native of Qiuyang County, Hubei Province. In 1930, he joined the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army and joined the Communist Party of China in the same year. During the agrarian revolutionary war, he served as a company commander, battalion commander, regimental chief of staff, and regimental commander of the 27th Regiment of the 9th Division of the 3rd Red Army in Western Hunan and Hubei. He participated in the anti-"encirclement and suppression" and long march in the Xiang'e-Exi and Xiang'echuan-Qiansu districts.
During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, he served as a staff officer of the Independent 1st Detachment of the 120th Division of the Eighth Route Army, the leader of the Independent 2nd Detachment, and the commander of the 714th Regiment of the 358th Brigade. He participated in the opening up of the anti-Japanese base area in northwestern Jin, the advance into Central Hebei, the anti-"sweeping" and the Hundred Regiments War. In November 1944, he joined the 5th Cadre Brigade of the Southbound Detachment of the Eighth Route Army, returned to the Laosu District of Honghu Lake, and served as the commander of the 5th Division of the New Fourth Army and the 45th Regiment of the 3rd Military Division of the Eyu-Anhui-Xianggan Military Region.
During the Liberation War, he served as deputy brigade commander and brigade commander of the Independent Brigade of the Jianghan Military Region, deputy commander of the Jianghan Military Region, brigade commander of the Field Brigade of the Northwest Hubei Military Region, commander of the 5th Military Subdistrict of the Northwest Hubei Military Region, commander of the Jianghuai Independent Brigade of the East China Military Region, commander of the 5th Division of the 2nd Column of the East China Field Army, chief of staff of the 34th Army of the Third Field Army, and deputy commander of the 22nd Army. He participated in the Central Plains Breakthrough and the battles of Huaihai, Dujiang, and Eastern Zhejiang.
After the founding of New China, he served as the commander of the 22nd Army, the political commissar and commander of the Zhousheng Fortress District, the deputy commander and commander of the Zhejiang Provincial Military Region, the commander of the Hubei Provincial Military Region, and the commander of the Wuhan Military Region. He was awarded the rank of major general in 1955.