Since ancient times, there have been many stories of women going to war in China, such as the Shang Dynasty's Princess Hao, the Tang Dynasty's Princess Pingyang, and the Ming Dynasty's Qin Liangyu are all excellent representatives.
In modern times, the people's army led by the Communist Party is a model of progress, and there are a large number of outstanding female comrades in any period, even in such a difficult journey as the 25,000-mile long march, there are many women involved.
However, by the time the title was awarded in 1955, most of the female cadres in the army had transferred to the local area, and at that time there was a rule, and they could not participate in the awarding of titles without the military system, so in the end, only one woman, Li Zhen, was awarded the rank of major general, which was a great honor for her personally.
But who would have thought that this only founding female general of New China was extremely unhappy in her childhood, suffered everything and served as a child bride. If she had been in the old society, her whole life would probably have been miserable like this, but fortunately, the Communist Party changed everything about her!
From a child bride to a majestic general, Li Zhen's experience can better reflect the changes brought by the Communist Party to the vast number of poor people!
Li Zhen was born in Liuyang, Hunan Province in 1908, her family only had a few acres of thin fields and simple grass houses, so the family conditions were not good, but her father Li Guangtian was very patriarchal and always wanted to have a son, but it seemed to be fate, and gave birth to six daughters in succession.
It was not rich, there were still so many people to eat, and life was very difficult. Her father was contemptuous of her daughters, and was reluctant to even take their official names, and Li Zhen initially had only one milk name "Danwazi".
When she was six years old, her father gave her to a family with an ancient surname to be a child bride, and Li Zhen at the time did not know what the word meant.
Her "fiancé" is called Gu Tianshun, who is very stubborn and often grabs Li Zhen and beats him unhappy. Li Zhen's childhood was so gloomy, she had to help chop firewood, cook, wash clothes, and do hygiene every day, and from time to time she had to be beaten, she also wanted to resist, but her family couldn't count on it, and she could only swallow her anger under the fence.
When Li Zhen was a little older, she learned about the world outside the countryside from other people, and she yearned in her heart, she very much hoped to go to the city to work, so that she could stay away from this nasty "home".
After the Gu family learned the news, they quickly held a wedding for Gu Tianshun and Li Zhen, wanting to bind her with this. So, Li Zhen married Gu Tianshun at the age of 16 and began a very unfortunate life.
For the injustice of life, Li Zhen does not know how to deal with it, her newlywed husband still has a bad attitude, even if his identity changes, he will often beat her.
This kind of dark life day after day makes Li Zhen less looking forward to the future, fortunately, the outside world is already quietly changing!
During the Great Revolution, the Kuomintang and the Communist Party cooperated, and the Communist Party began to carry out peasant revolutionary movements in many places, Liuyang being one of the important areas. Li Zhen had never read a book, but she understood the reason, so under the guidance of her sister, she decided to join the local women's association.
When the registrar heard that she was a child bride, she immediately agreed to her request to join. However, when filling in the name, there was a little accident. She didn't have a name at the time, saying that her name was "Danwazi", which was obviously difficult to record, so the registration officer asked her to think again.
After thinking about it for a while, she thought that she should be loyal after joining the organization, so she named herself "Li Zhen", and the registration staff was bright, and praised the name one after another. It's sad to think about it, she is obviously 18 years old, but at this moment she has her official name.
In order to express her ambition, she cut out her long invention ambition, and since then she has actively participated in various revolutionary activities, conveying many important messages to the organization. The Gu family tried to block it many times, and the women's association came forward to help.
Because of her outstanding performance, Li Zhen was approved to join the Communist Party of China in March 1927, and with the help of the party, she was very excited, and she finally had hope that she would no longer have to live her life as a "child bride".
Chiang Kai-shek staged a "counter-revolutionary coup" in April 1927, and for some time thereafter, reactionaries in several important cities followed in Chiang's footsteps and began to massacre communists and progressives. Li Zhang, director of women of the special committee of the Xiang-Hubei-Jiangxi Border Region, and Yi Weiwu, a female Communist Party member, both died tragically.
Li Zhen's name is also on the wanted list, but she is lucky enough to run back to her home early to escape. When the Gu family learned of this, they were afraid of being implicated, and they declared everywhere that they had nothing to do with Li Zhen and sent a letter of suspension to Li's family.
This is the only good news for Li Zhen, she no longer has the shackles of the old society on her body.
The letter sent by the Gu family made Li Zhen realize that her hometown was not safe, and in order not to affect her parents, she entered the deep mountains and old forests on the border of Xianggan alone, hoping to find the members of the organization who escaped. Fortunately, she really met three comrades, Liu Xianxing, Liu Zhengyuan and Li Huidong.
In the face of the desperate situation, the four maintained a positive and optimistic attitude, all believing that the revolution would succeed, and then established a temporary party branch of Yonghe District in Liuyang County, with Li Zhenlai as secretary. They trekked through mountains and rivers together, and after many hardships, they finally connected with Wang Shoudao, secretary of the Liuyang County CPC Committee.
In September of the same year, the Autumn Harvest Uprising led by Chairman Mao broke out, and when the rebel army attacked Liuyang, Li Zhen led his comrades to give a lot of cooperation. Later, due to the crazy counterattack of the Kuomintang army, the chairman could only lead the remnants of the rebel army to Jinggangshan, at which time Li Zhen decided to stay and continue to develop the local revolutionary forces, and became the chairman of the Liudong guerrilla group as the soldiers' commissar.
Don't look at her just a woman's body, but she fought extremely bravely, once the reactionaries surrounded them on the top of the mountain, and after several bloody battles they could not rush out, Li Zhen roared: Can't be captured alive by the enemy, let's jump down together. With that, she took the lead and jumped off the cliff. Fortunately hung by a branch, she miraculously survived.
During the Liudong guerrilla fighting, Li Zhen developed a relationship with the guerrilla political commissar Zhang Qilong and married in 1932. It's just that later the revolution developed rapidly, and the two worked hard in their respective posts, and the intersection became less and less day by day, and finally they calmly divorced.
Later, Li Zhen served as the head of the Military Department of the Ji'an County Party Committee, the head of the Organization Department of the Political Department of the Sixth Red Army Corps, and the deputy head of the Organization Department of the Political Department of the Second Red Front. Unfortunately, the road was too bumpy, and their baby was born prematurely at seven months.
The environment at that time was too poor and there was not enough nutrition, and the child died not long after. This experience left Li Zhen with a very serious illness, and she was childless for the rest of her life.
However, these sufferings did not separate the two, and Gan Siqi once said: We do revolution for the sake of successors, not to pass on our own lineage. This is not a love word, which made Li Zhen very moved. And later the two really worked hard to realize this sentence - they adopted more than twenty martyr orphans and have been extremely caring for them.
Li Zhen served as director of the Political Department directly under the 120th Division during the Anti-Japanese War period, director of the Political Department directly under the Northwest Field Army during the Liberation War, and secretary general of the Political Department of the Chinese Volunteers during the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea.
For these contributions, she was awarded the rank of major general in 1955! It was also in this year that she decided to go back to her hometown to see if the home she had been thinking about that day and night had changed.
When the old family heard that the only founding female general was going to return, they were particularly excited and gathered early to greet them. It's just that one person in the crowd looks more afraid and only dares to watch from afar. After seeing that Li Zhen, who came back, was really a former deceased, he returned home with a dead face.
This person is Li Zhen's ex-husband Gu Tianshun, and when he thought of abusing Li Zhen like that, he only felt that he was about to face great trouble. However, he waited at home for a few days and found that Li Zhen did not want to come to his trouble, and soon someone brought a sentence: The past has passed, the revolution has triumphed, and we have entered a new era.
Gu Tianshun breathed a sigh of relief, and he didn't know what kind of mood he was in at that moment.
Gu Tianshun just scared himself, the Communist Party members would not be as narrow-minded as he thought, Li Zhen also told people about this past, she said with a smile: In fact, I am very grateful to them, if not for their persecution, I might not have participated in the revolution, and I would not be where I am today.
Only a vast pattern can have such a mind! Li Zhen has since lived in an old courtyard in Beijing, her clothes patched and not changed, the bathroom often leaks, you have to pad bricks to leave, and there is no heating in winter.
The leader of the General Political Department couldn't stand it and said that she should change her living environment, but Li Zhen didn't care and said: I have a way to protect myself from the cold, the house can still be lived in, and the state should use the money where it is more needed.
When Li Zhen died in 1990, her will was very simple, dividing her property into three parts: one part was donated to the educational institution in her hometown, one part was paid to the party fee, and the other part was donated to the Children's Palace.
At the last moment of her life, her heart was still thinking of the country and the next generation, and she was a glorious member of the Communist Party!