On November 14, 1930, Yang Kaihui, a great female revolutionary fighter and the first wife of Comrade Mao Zedong, was brutally killed by the Kuomintang!
After Comrade Mao Zedong learned of this news, he was devastated and wrote down several big characters: "Kaihui's death, a hundred lives can not be redeemed."
But he always thought that Yang Kaihui's murderer was the Kuomintang general He Jian.
It was not until 1970 that Chairman Mao learned that there was someone else who killed Comrade Yang Kaihui.
When Yang Kaihui was shot, he was seriously injured but did not die.
Someone heard the news and went back to make up a shot, which led to her death.
So, what is the truth of Yang Kaihui's death? Who gave her the last shot? After the chairman learned the truth, how did he deal with the real culprit?
Figure 1 Yang Kaihui
First, Yang Kaihui and his people
Yang Kaihui grew up in an enlightened environment.
Her father, Yang Changji, studied abroad, and when he returned from abroad every two years, he would tell her some foreign observations and simple truths.
This keeps her thinking very advanced.
Don't look at Yang Kaihui as a daughter, her favorite article is "Mulan Ci".
Wen Li Hua Mulan's story of serving in the army for her father and defending her family has always influenced her, and she also dreams of becoming a patriot who does not let her eyebrows be shaved.
Under the influence of his father and "Mulan Ci", Yang Kaihui behaved very unusually when he was in school!
She studied at the Fuxiang Girls' High School run by the Changsha Church, where students were required to pray and have long hair.
But Yang Kaihui did not take the usual path, she did not do worship, but also the only student in the school to cut her hair short!
This caused the school to feel a headache, thinking that she was "over-radical", and ordered her to lengthen her hair within three months and not to cut it short.
Figure 2
But Yang Kaihui always believes that cutting her hair is her own freedom, and the school has no right to interfere!
So she kept her short, crisp hair, and even the school couldn't do anything about her.
During her school days, she also published sharp articles in Fuxiang's school magazine and Hunan Popular Daily, such as "Attack on the Root of Inequality".
With fluent words and pungent brushstrokes, he violently attacked feudal thought!
Her idea is that women are not allowed to be treated as appendages! Women also need equal laws!
In those days, women were almost seen as appendages of men, and everything revolved around the family.
Yang Kaihui, on the other hand, does not think so, she feels that women are independent individuals, they have their own thoughts and opinions, and they do not live for others.
As a woman with a new era of ideas, Yang Kaihui has a lot of fame in the local area, and local women admire her.
Figure 3
It was precisely because of her advanced thinking and good courage that she and Chairman Mao came together hand in hand.
In the winter of 1920, at the age of 19, Yang Kaihui joined the Chinese Socialist Youth League and became one of the first members of the Hunan Youth League.
Then, at the end of the year, with the courage of "not being a layman", she and Comrade Mao Zedong held a simple wedding with no dowry, no bride price, and no palanquin.
At the end of the following year, Yang Kaihui officially joined the Communist Party of China and fought for communism.
In 1922, Comrade Mao Zedong established the Xiang District Committee of the Communist Party of China, and after serving as the secretary of the district party committee, Yang Kaihui became his right-hand man.
Yang Kaihui was responsible for the confidential and transportation liaison work of the party committee.
The seat of the district party committee outside Xiaowumen in Changsha is the couple's home.
Together, they engaged in important revolutionary work here and made great contributions to the development of the revolutionary cause.
Figure 4
The time spent working with Comrade Mao Zedong was the period when Yang Kaihui felt happiest.
By October 1922, she had given birth to her eldest son, Mao Anying, and became a great mother, and Comrade Mao Zedong was promoted to father.
Their second son, Mao Anqing, was born in November 1923.
Comrade Mao Zedong was very fond of his two children, but he could not accompany them because he had to carry out revolutionary work.
In April 1924, he went to Shanghai to work in the Shanghai Party Central Committee.
In order to help him start his work, in June of the same year, Yang Kaihui also came to Shanghai with two children and participated in the organization of a girls' industrial school.
After that, she has been with Comrade Mao Zedong, assisting him in some revolutionary work, helping each other and sharing hardships.
Unfortunately, in 1927, after Yang Kaihui and Comrade Mao Zedong separated, they could not wait for her beloved husband to return.
Figure 5
2. Arrested by the Kuomintang
In August 1927, the Communist Party established the general policy of carrying out the agrarian revolution and armed resistance against the Kuomintang reactionaries, and decided to lead and launch the Autumn Harvest Uprising under the leadership of Comrade Mao Zedong and Lu Deming.
Before leaving, Comrade Mao Zedong instructed Yang Kaihui to take good care of herself and her children.
And Yang Kaihui also told him to hide well, and she waited for her husband to return safely.
Unexpectedly, this farewell turned out to be a farewell!
After the failure of the Autumn Harvest Uprising, Yang Kaihui obeyed the party's arrangement and returned to Changsha Bancang with her children.
While in Itakura, she still fought underground, and even though she lost contact with her superiors, she resolutely insisted on fighting for three years.
At this time, the nationalist general He Jian was also wantonly arresting the families of the Communist Party.
In order to arrest Yang Kaihui, he even offered a reward of 1,000 silver dollars, claiming that as long as anyone who can report Yang Kaihui's traces can get 1,000 silver dollars.
Figure 6
The people of Changsha are people who know the great righteousness, and after seeing the reward announced by He Jian, they secretly protected Yang Kaihui's mother and son, and repeatedly let her be murdered.
However, the god of luck could not bless her all the time.
She eventually fell into the hands of the Kuomintang and was persecuted.
On October 24, 1930, Yang Kaihui secretly sneaked back to Itakura because he missed his mother and children too much, and wanted to go to his home to have a look.
As a result, the warlord agent found her figure and followed her until she returned home.
Then, the Kuomintang, who had been informed by the secret agents, surrounded her home and arrested her and 8-year-old Mao Anying!
After being arrested, Yang Kaihui suffered a series of threats, inducements and severe torture, but she has always been unyielding!
In the face of the fierce Kuomintang, she said with great righteousness: "Death can only frighten the cowards, and it cannot frighten the Communists!"
Figure 7
He Jian saw that Yang Kaihui was so resolute, so he changed a way to make her submit.
He Jian claimed that as long as Yang Kaihui could openly break away from Comrade Mao Zedong, he would let Yang Kaihui's mother and son leave.
Yang Kaihui knew in her heart that once she agreed to this request, it would not only have an impact on Comrade Mao Zedong, but also have a great negative impact on the Communist Party.
So she replied without hesitation: "I want to disassociate myself from Comrade Mao Zedong, unless the sea is dry and rotten!"
Yang Kaihui's words made He Jian very angry, and he felt that Yang Kaihui was toasting and not eating and eating penalty wine!
So in a fit of anger, he wanted to execute Yang Kaihui.
However, after Yang Kaihui's mother Xiang Zhenxi learned that her daughter and grandson had been arrested, she immediately found her husband's former friends Zhang Shizhao, Cai Yuanpei and other well-known literati, and put pressure on He Jian to force him to release Yang Kaihui.
This puts a lot of pressure on He Jian.
Figure 8 Ho key
In order to have a legitimate reason to execute Yang Kaihui, He Jian first found a group of lazy hooligans in the local area and instructed them to carry out a demonstration on the street to "execute Yang Kaihui".
In this way, we can resist the pressure of public opinion from All walks of life in Hunan and even the whole of China.
Then, He Jian used the absurd reason that "if Yang Kaihui is not removed, it will be difficult for the people to be indignant", Chiang Kai-shek ordered Yang Kaihui to be executed and "beheaded to show the public".
For his own death, Yang Kaihui had actually anticipated it long ago.
So when her sixth aunt came to visit her, she specifically asked her aunt to buy some cigarette butter and a mirror for herself.
She told the sixth aunt that she was ready to sacrifice at any time, usually simple and habitual, and always had to dress up before sacrifice.
On November 14, 1930, the autumn morning was mixed with a hint of coolness, and Yang Kaihui was calmly escorted by the Kuomintang reactionaries to the rickshaw for an hour.
Figure 9
Subsequently, she was escorted to the Literacy Ridge outside the Liuyang Gate in Changsha, where she died heroically.
After Yang Kaihui's sacrifice, forced by the pressure of public opinion, He Jian had no choice but to spare Yang Kaihui's mother and child.
Yang Kaihui's body was buried by relatives on the cotton slope of his hometown Bancang.
After learning of the sacrifice of his beloved wife, Comrade Mao Zedong was both heartbroken and guilty, so he sent a letter to the Yang family. It reads "Kaihui's death, a hundred bodies can not redeem" several big characters, and sent money to Yang Kaihui to repair the tombstone.
Since then, he has often entrusted people to visit Yang Kaihui's grave, and treated Yang Kaihui's mother as his own mother, sending him to the end of his life.
After the founding of New China, Chairman Mao still missed Yang Kaihui very much.
In 1957, when he wrote a letter to Li Shuyi, the widow of the late Liu Zhixun, he wrote a poem "Butterfly Love Flower Answering Li Shuyi", the first sentence was "I lost my pride Yang Jun lost Willow".
Figure 10
Proud Yang refers to Yang Kaihui, while Liu refers to Liu Zhixun.
In this poem, he uses "proud" instead of "petite", representing his respect and pride for Yang Kaihui.
But yang kaihui's sacrifice has always been a knot in Chairman Mao's heart.
Because Yang Kaihui's murder was carried out in secret at that time, he never knew the truth about Yang Kaihui's murder.
I only know that there were two theories circulating at that time, one was that Yang Kaihui was beheaded and died, and the other said that he was shot.
The beheading is more popular and has been recognized by the people.
However, the truth of Yang Kaihui's murder has never been known, and the only breakthrough was He Jian, who ordered Yang Kaihui's execution at that time.
However, after the founding of New China in 1949, He Jian fled to Taiwan with Chiang Kai-shek and died in Taiwan on April 25, 1956.
The truth of Yang Kaihui's brutal murder seems to never be known.
Figure 11
However, in the early 1970s, things suddenly took a turn for the better!
Third, the truth about Yang Kaihui's murder
In early 1970, one of He Jian's subordinates, Yao Chuzhong, was arrested, and the truth about Yang Kaihui's murder was revealed!
After the founding of New China, Yao Chuzhong, who had served as a soldier in the Kuomintang troops, was also sent to a farm in Yueyang, Hunan Province, for reconstruction.
In 1970, yao Chuzhong was suddenly reported as one of the executioners who killed Yang Kaihui, and the police then arrested Yao Chuzhong.
With a series of investigations by the public security department and Yao Chuzhong's confession, the process of Yang Kaihui's murder was finally known to everyone.
It turned out that the heartbroken He Jian wanted to behead Yang Kaihui and show it to the public.
But I don't know why, but I suddenly changed my mind and issued an equally cruel order: shoot, three days of violence!
Figure 12
After breakfast on November 14, 1930, Yan Guowu, the executive officer of the Fourth Company of Secret Agents and one of the supervisors, blew a gathering whistle, claiming to run Yang Kaihui and let everyone be vigilant.
Then, Yang Kaihui was taken to the Qing Dynasty-style "Yamen".
On either side of the gate stood two rows of heavily armed Kuomintang agents, which looked quite ironic.
After Yang Kaihui was escorted, he was sentenced to "shooting".
After that, he was tied with hemp rope and escorted by Kuomintang agents to a yellow van and paraded the streets for an hour.
After the end of the parade, Yang Kaihui was taken to the remote and sparsely populated Literacy Ridge.
Yang Kaihui had long known that there would be such a day, and before she sacrificed, she still calmly faced the enemy.
She knew that one day, her husband and the Communists would triumph and crush the murderous Kuomintang mob.
With the sound of two gunshots, Yang Kaihui, a heroic revolutionary female fighter, fell in a pool of blood.
Figure 13
However, after Yang Kaihui was shot twice, he did not die immediately.
After the Kuomintang executed Yang Kaihui, Yao Chuzhong and another Kuomintang executioner, Luo Guolin, thought she had died and untied the ropes on her.
Then, the two left with the Kuomintang team.
Unexpectedly, just after eating at noon, Yao Chuzhong received an order, saying that Yang Kaihui was not dead.
Therefore, Yao Chuzhong immediately went to the Literacy Ridge to check the situation.
It turned out that Yang Kaihui was creeping on the barren grass, his mouth was full of mud and sand, and his body was full of bright red blood!
Her hands were clasped tightly into the dirt, and she had already cut two holes in the ground, perhaps trying to use her last strength to crawl back to see her child.
But Yao Chuzhong saw such a scene, without the slightest pity, he did not hesitate to pull the trigger and make up another shot.
Figure 14
In this way, Yang Kaihui, who could have survived, closed his eyes forever because of this last shot.
Because of the brutal killing of Yang Kaihui, in July 1974, Yao Chuzhong finally got the punishment he deserved.
He was eventually sentenced to death for counter-revolutionary homicide and immediately executed.
At this time, 44 years have passed since Yang Kaihui's sacrifice.
Yang Kaihui is not only Chairman Mao's wife, but also a heroic and great revolutionary martyr.
Our happy life today is bought by countless martyrs like her, who have thrown their heads and spilled their blood.
In her honor, in November 1966, the Hunan government repaired her former residence and opened it to the public.
On the top of the cotton broken hill 300 meters to the right of the former residence is Yang Kaihui's cemetery.
Every special day, people come here to pay their respects to this heroic revolutionary martyr.
Figure 15
It is worth mentioning that in 1980, when the Hunan government was repairing Yang Kaihui's former residence, it also found a number of handwritten letters written by her in 1928 in the cracks of the wall.
The letter reveals her unwavering love for Chairman Mao and her worries about the future of her children.
Unfortunately, Chairman Mao had been dead for many years and could no longer know the contents of the letter.
Yang Kaihui is a well-deserved heroine, she was once deeply respected by people, and she is always worthy of being remembered by our descendants.
When we are in a bright life, we must remember that our light and happiness were bought with the blood of countless revolutionary ancestors.