From the "new life society" to the new life
The former site of the Xinsheng Society
It is located at No. 2 Yunfangli, Jianshe Road, Heping District
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Yunfangli Community is located on Jianshe Road, Heping District, Tianjin. Rows of gray and clumsy green brick buildings are wrapped in prosperity, but they are very quiet. Against the backdrop of the surrounding high-rise buildings, the walls of these hundred-year-old buildings are mottled, as if they are still immersed in the old times, and they are surprisingly low-key. The streets here are very narrow. Cars are difficult to drive in, and even the electric three-wheeled entry and exit of the elderly is not loose. Enter the alley, do not have to go too far, turn the corner to the right, that is Yunfangli No. 2. On the blue-gray brick wall, a white jade sign is engraved with several golden characters such as "Old Site of Xinsheng Society". Gold has the temperature of light, allowing the viewer to travel through a hundred years of time and space, and feel the hot heart of the hot-blooded youth of that year in pursuit of truth and light.
After the outbreak of the May Fourth Movement, the broad masses of patriotic youth responded quickly and soon developed into a nationwide anti-imperialist and anti-feudal revolutionary movement with the broad participation of the proletariat, petty bourgeoisie and national bourgeoisie. Zhou Enlai and Yu Fangzhou, who joined the revolution in their youth, also met during this period.
According to Liu Qingyang's recollection: "Some of the students at that time were young people from bourgeois and petty-bourgeois families, and they only participated in the May Fourth Movement with a patriotic enthusiasm, and they had no master in their hearts about how they should persist in the struggle, so once the school and family obstructed them, some students believed that the traitors had been deposed, the Paris Peace Conference had refused to sign, the movement had been going on for more than two months, there was nothing to do, and the mood of struggle was relaxed. The Tianjin Federation of Students felt that the situation was not right, and tried its best to find a way to maintain the patriotic activities of the Federation, and encouraged the backbone elements to concentrate on their offices and move into Nankai School. It was in this context that Yu Fangzhou moved into the Nankai campus and met Zhou Enlai, who had recently returned from studying in Japan. The two were like-minded, often organizing student movements together, fighting side by side, and exploring the road to saving the country and the people.
With the rise of the call for "social transformation," Tianjin set off an upsurge of studying and propagating Marxism. The early spread of Marxism in Tianjin was carried out under the direct guidance of Li Dazhao, who educated and trained a group of progressive young people and advanced intellectuals who studied new ideas and accepted new trends of thought, guided them to study and master Marxist theory, and integrated with the workers' movement. Together, they studied Marxist articles, and through the establishment of social organizations, they studied and propagated Marxism and explored the way to save the country and save the people.
The concrete manifestation of Li Dazhao's dissemination of Marxism was to write a large number of articles propagating Marxism for progressive youth to read better, and then guide them to establish revolutionary associations. It was in this political environment that the Xinsheng Society was established in September 1919 under the specific guidance of Li Dazhao. It is directly subordinate to the provincial first middle school and directly subordinate to the first women's normal students as the backbone, members include Yu Fangzhou, Han Linfu, Chen Jinghu, An Xingsheng, Wang Tianlin, Lu Xiaoyu, Li Peiliang, Wang Lihua, Wang Tonghua and more than ten other people.
"The fierce waves are strictly pressed on all sides, and the crowds of people on the other side are in urgent need of boats." What is the weight of the Ark? What is the opposite of the Ark? The young Yu Fangzhou faced the situation of the broken country of Shenzhou and the people's lack of livelihood, and wrote a self-warning word as an encouragement. He led a group of enthusiastic young people who were determined to find the light, born from the New Life Society, determined to pursue the best dreams of mankind.
In late July 1919, the Beiyang government declared martial law against Shandong in order to suppress the Shandong patriotic movement. Zhou Enlai published an article entitled "Dark Forces" in the August 6 Tianjin Student Federation Newspaper and sent someone to Jinan to investigate and interview and expose the truth of the bloody case. On August 23, on the same day that Liu Qingyang, Guo Longzhen, and 10 other representatives from all walks of life in Tianjin went to the Beijing Presidential Palace to petition and be arrested, Yu Fangzhou, who persisted in the struggle in Tianjin, was also arrested by the authorities.
According to Wang Zhenru's recollection, on August 23, 1919, Tianjin students assisted the patriotic masses in Shandong, and Yu Fangzhou publicized in the streets to expose the crime of Shooting and Killing Patriotic People by Ma Liang, the town guard of Shandong Town. After his release from prison, Ark continued to do patriotic propaganda and did not flinch a little because of his arrest.
It was during the half month that Ark was detained that the "Awakening Society" was established. Yu Fangzhou realized that with the deepening of the movement, the general mass organizations could no longer meet the needs of revolutionary activities, and more rigorous groups should be formed, and the initial stage should not be too large, so as not to attract the attention of the authorities. Small and numerous groups can echo each other, support each other, and flexibly respond to the intervention, dissolution, and seizure of the authorities. It was precisely on the basis of this situation that after Yu Fangzhou was released from prison, he immediately contacted Han Linfu, An Xingsheng, Chen Jinghu and other students of the Provincial First Middle School. In late September, the Xinsheng Society was established.
It is worth adding that before the establishment of the Awakening Society and the New Students' Club, the Tianjin Student Organization was customarily separate for boys and girls, because most schools at that time did not accept girls, and girls had to go to girls' schools. The establishment of the Awakening Society and the Freshman Society broke the boundaries between co-educational schools and separate groups for boys and girls. After more than two months of practice, the young people decided to try to change the original single boys' school boys' union into a new student union that can participate in boys' and girls' schools. Thus, as the first secretary of the History of Tianjin of the Communist Party of China (Volume I) stated: "Driven by the Awakening Society and the Freshman Society, on December 10, 1919, students from male and female schools above the middle school level in Tianjin formed a new student federation. The "co-ed group" of the Tianjin Students' Federation was a major event that shook the society at that time, so it also attracted great attention from the media, such as the "Grand Situation of the Establishment of the New Student Federation": At 2 o'clock yesterday afternoon, the new Tianjin Secondary School Students Federation of Tianjin Boys' and Girls' School Students held an inaugural meeting at the Beima Road General Chamber of Commerce. The meeting was attended by representatives of various groups and representatives of students from various schools, with a total of more than 500 people.
The establishment of the Xinsheng Society and its later activities were given special care and specific guidance by Li Dazhao. The members often studied together the Marxist readings recommended by Li Dazhao, studied articles such as "The Victory of the Common People", "The Victory of Bolshevism", and "My Marxist View", and the direction of struggle became clearer and clearer, and the belief in communism became firmer. In order to publicize Marxism more widely and deeply, on April 1, 1920, the Xinsheng Society founded the magazine "Xinsheng". Adhere to the purpose of publishing the propositions of the New Life Society and introducing new ideas. When the journal was founded, Li Dazhao came to Tianjin to show concern and support for the tianjin youth in creating a new ideological position, and praised "Xinsheng" magazine as a publication with socialist overtones. In this journal, the members will write and publish articles on the experience of learning and the results of research and discussion, so that more people can understand and accept the new ideas of Marxism. For the first time, Xinsheng magazine also raised the issue of establishing a Communist Party organization in Tianjin.
Zhou Wei, a researcher at the Local Party History Research Office of the Party School of the Tianjin Municipal CPC Committee, introduced that after the establishment of the Xinsheng Society and the Awakening Society, they fought side by side with the Tianjin Federation of All Walks of Life, the Federation of Students, and other revolutionary groups, and gradually became the backbone of the leading patriotic movement of Tianjin students. In January 1920, during the boycott of Japanese goods, Zhou Enlai, Ma Jun, Yu Fangzhou, Li Peiliang, Guo Longzhen, Zhang Ruoming, and other representatives from all walks of life were arrested by the directly subordinate authorities and imprisoned for 173 days. Even in prison, the Enlightenment Society and the Shinshin Society are fighting side by side. After being released from prison, they left behind a precious historical group photo – in which Zhou Enlai and Yu Fangzhou stand side by side.
The Xinsheng Society is growing day by day. In the autumn of 1920, under the care of Li Dazhao, the Tianjin Marxism Research Association was established on the basis of the Xinsheng Society, and the journal was founded to introduce the situation in Soviet Russia after the October Revolution and publicize revolutionary ideas. Later, the research association became the organizational basis for the early creation of the Socialist Youth League in Tianjin, and some of their members were the first communists in Tianjin when the party was founded. Among them, Yu Fangzhou, An Xingsheng, Li Peiliang and others became the founders and main leaders of the local party organization in Tianjin. History has proved that the founding of the Xinsheng Society and its social practice activities have laid the ideological foundation and cadre foundation for the establishment of local party organizations in Tianjin, and have left indelible and brilliant achievements in the history of tianjin's revolutionary struggle.
The years are quiet, how easy it is to say, and how difficult it is to become. At that time, the revolutionary ancestors ran for the revolution, faced with shackles and iron windows, faced with batons and whips, faced with death and blood, for the sake of revolution and faith, they chose to die generously, without hesitation. The establishment of the Xinsheng Society and its social practice activities laid a solid foundation for the establishment of local party organizations in Tianjin and composed a magnificent triumphant song in the history of the Tianjin revolution.
Today, the small building of Yunfangli No. 2 is quietly bathed in daylight. As the eyes of posterity glanced at its mottled old walls and faded old windows, they saw the flocks of pigeons on the roof leisurely hanging their wings. The solemn oath of the members of the newborn society resounded in their ears, and their feelings of home and country, loyalty and faith, and the spirit of unremitting struggle for the truth radiated an immortal light, and that light would surely illuminate a hundred years, and another hundred years.
Li Dazhao (1889~1927), Zi Shouchang, a native of Leting, Hebei. In 1907, he was admitted to the Tianjin Beiyang Law and Politics College, and after graduating in 1913, he traveled east to Japan to study politics at Waseda University in Tokyo, where he was a pioneer of the Chinese communist movement, a great Marxist, an outstanding proletarian revolutionary, and one of the main founders of the Communist Party of China. Comrade Li Dazhao's lifelong course of struggle is closely linked to the history of the spread of Marxism in China, the history of the founding of the Communist Party of China, the history of seeking happiness for the Chinese and the people under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, and the establishment of immortal meritorious deeds for national independence and the liberation of the people, the prosperity and strength of the country, and the happiness of the people.
Chen Jinghu (1901~1933), Ziyintan, Xiaoqiu. Pseudonym Li Tieran, formerly known as Chen Longchuan, Chen Shiqiu, Li Guocai, Li Xuekong, and Gong Ziming. A native of Nanjing Village, Fushan Township, Jianping County, Liaoning Province. A member of the Communist Party of China He participated in the revolution during the Great Revolution and served as the head of the Rehe Working Committee of the CPC and the secretary of the Inner Mongolia Special Committee of the CPC. Early revolutionary activist of the Party in Liaoning.
Han Zhixiang (1900~1934), also known as Han Linfu, Zi Ruiwu, male, Han ethnicity, was born on February 11, 26th year of Qing Guangxu (1900 AD) to a peasant family in Hala Mutou Village, Fengshuigou Town, Yuanbaoshan District, Chifeng City, Inner Mongolia, with his ancestral home in Dongsu Village, Peilin Township, Yuci County, Shanxi Province. In 1916, he was admitted to Tianjin Zhili No. 1 Middle School to study. In 1919, he participated in the "May Fourth" Movement in Tianjin and organized the establishment of the student progress organization "Xinsheng Society" and "Xiangming Society". On September 22, 1934, he was assassinated by Zheng Pilie, a kuomintang military command agent, outside the Zhenwu Temple in Dongsu Village, Shanxi Province, at the age of 34.
Yu Fangzhou (1900~1927), formerly known as Yu Lanzhu, was a native of Ninghe County, Zhili Province. When the May Fourth Movement broke out in 1919, Yu Ark immediately threw himself into the revolutionary torrent of anti-imperialist and patriotic struggle. He organized the "Student National Salvation League", served as the head of the group, and was successively elected as a member of the tianjin federation of students and a student representative of the tianjin federation of all walks of life. In September, he initiated the organization of the progressive group "Xinsheng Society" and founded the magazine "Xinsheng". In 1922, Yu Fangzhou was introduced by Li Dazhao to join the Communist Party of China. After the defeat of the Great Revolution in 1927, Yu Fangzhou, as the director of the Organization Department of the Shunzhi Provincial CPC Committee, led the second Yutian Rebellion in eastern Jidong and was unfortunately arrested. On the night of December 30, 1927, Yu Fangzhou was killed by the enemy at the age of 27.