Chen Xi narrated: The history of Liu Yanzhang, the "top man in the armed arts" in Pixian County of the Republic of China

Liu Yanzhang, a native of Liantan Village, Daishan Township. In Pixi, the elderly all call "Liu Fei" (one called "Liu Bandit"). Japanese pseudo-period. He is both an official and a bandit, acting as the king of the mountain in Suyang Mountain, and his history of development and murder is the history of disasters and hatred of the people of Pixi.

Liu Yanzhang's grandfather was a very good farmer in the late Qing Dynasty. Like all the peasants in old China, he was frugal and spent most of the money he saved on buying land for his children and grandchildren, and by the time Liu's father, Liu Zuoyi, had become a landlord with 100 acres of land. In Liantan Village at that time, the Liu family was able to rely on their wealth to become a more prominent family in the village day by day.

Liu Yanzhang's father was a more discerning farmer, and he knew that he could not make his family really have status just because he had property. So he spent money to donate to a private school to make his son fluent in writing and ink. Later, Liu relied on his wealth to get his son the position of commanding the township training of Ningning Township (located in Liantan Village), and soon Liu Yanzhang climbed to the throne of the head of Ningning Township. In this way, Liu Yanzhang has become a relatively high-status figure in the township.

However, Liu Yanzhang could not completely control everything in Tranquility Township at this time. People of the age know that in the past, in the rural areas, there were some people who relied on their own ability and power to become representative and authoritative figures in the township, and they were called "top people in the armed forces", and they could often influence people and things in a place. At that time, there was such a person in Liantan Village, his name was Liu Buzhou, the word Dengying, he was the old patriarch surnamed Liu in Liantan Village at that time, and he was also a person who had both civil and military skills, both official and private, and was deeply respected by Liantan Village and the people around him. If Liu Yanzhang wants to become a character calling for wind and rain in Tranquility Township, he must obviously get rid of this person. Although Er Liu is a family relative, he finally became an enemy. Liu Yanzhang bribed the local Kuomintang troops stationed in Bayiji at that time and killed Liu Buzhou on "trumped-up" charges. Since then, Liu has thoroughly made himself the number one person in Tranquility Township. The regimental training of forty or fifty people in Tranquility Township became the foundation of Liu's development.

In the early autumn of 1938, after the Japanese invaded the Xuhai area, due to the corruption and incompetence of the Kuomintang government, some prominent figures in many places fell to the side of the Japanese invaders. His township regiment was trained into an armed organization that maintained local law and order and looted people's property. At the same time, in the land of Pixi, the bandits are even more rampant, some ruffians and hooligans recruit troops and buy horses, set up the so-called "for the way of heaven" banner, burning, killing and looting everywhere, all kinds of evil, Pixi Belt Shiqiao, Liuji, Daishan, Suyang Mountain, Pengzhuang and other places are the strongholds of horse thieves. At that time, a few poems that circulated in Pixi were enough to prove that bandits were rampant.

(1) Flower hand pinching, eye patch,

Raise the tree and carry the gun.

Steel cannon shell, copper cannon shell,

Catch the turtle grandson and ask for a pimple.

Eight hundred, give eight hundred,

Don't give eight hundred to push with cannons.

(2) The door is closed at sunset, and everything is not to be asked.

The owner was robbed, and the west pretended to be deaf and dumb.

If you want money, give money, if you want horses, give horses quickly,

If you want a daughter, firecrackers are delivered to your home.

Seeing this chaotic situation, Liu Yanzhang quickly swelled his ambitions and felt that it was a good time for him to start his own business. So he used the armed forces in his hands to attack the bandit strongholds everywhere. With this move, he killed two birds with one stone, openly confusing the common people who had suffered from the disaster, and secretly enriching and strengthening his own armament. At that time, the bandits in all directions were afraid of him, and some even begged him for mercy and release. For a while, he deceived the trust of the masses and gained great prestige.

In 1939, after subduing the arrogance of the bandits around him, Liu no longer set his sights on the territory of only a few small villages in Ningning Township, and began to extend his sense of touch to farther and bigger places.

He took a fancy to the hilly and undulating bandits at the bay of the Bulao River, and the Suyang Mountain occupied by Han Baozhang. The terrain was dangerous, easy to attack and defend, and the land was fertile enough to raise troops, so he decided to attack Suyang Mountain.

However, it was not easy to attack Han Baozhang, who was entrenched in danger and had more than 200 troops, with only a few dozen of his own armed village training. He needs help. He repeatedly asked Chen Baozhu, the head of Huade Township (stationed in Jingdun) (later suppressed), and Chen Yongchang, the head of Jingdun Township, to assist in the attack. Because in the past, Jingdun has a glorious history of fighting bandits, from the end of the Qing Dynasty to the Anti-Japanese War before the Anti-Japanese War, the Big Knife Society and the White Flag Society were organized to fight against horse thieves, and twenty or thirty people were sacrificed because of this, and the bandits from all over the world were terrified. Liu's request for assistance from Chen in Jingdun Township was to borrow both soldiers and prestige to achieve his personal ambitions, which was Liu's cleverness. A few years later, he cooperated with the Japanese army to create the blood-stained Jingdun "8.2 Massacre", which has been scolded by the Jingdun people to this day.

At the beginning of the 39th year, Liu Yanzhang, with the assistance of more than 100 township practitioners led by Chen Baozhu, Chen Yongchang, and Qiu Peiyuan of Huade Township, united with the family members of Laoyanzi Village, Gengjishan Township, Tongshan County, and Geng Rongkun and Zhang Jinfang (nickname: Zhang Liumazi) of Geng Zhangzhuang, and suddenly attacked Han Baozhang's bandit stronghold in Suyangshan, completely annihilating Han Baozhang's forces (Han Baozhang fled to Donghai County, and was later falsely appointed as the head of the self-defense regiment by the Japanese and colluded with Liu Xin).

After Liu annihilated Han, he used this as a base to begin his criminal anti-communist and anti-people career. After the attack on Korea, Liu recruited troops and horses, and quickly grew to more than 300 people.

In order to realize his ambition of invading China, the Japanese invaders vigorously supported lackeys in China, recruited bandits and traitors from various channels, and gave officials and knighthoods to serve as their tools. The Japanese and puppet governments in Pi County took a fancy to Liu Yanzhang. Soon after Liu occupied Suyang Mountain, he was appointed as the head of the fifth district and the head of the self-defense regiment by Qi Wu, the big traitor and pseudo-county magistrate of Pi County. At this time, Liu Yanzhang's ambition, which combined the strength of the army and the political power, was initially repaid, and after attacking South Korea, he really gained a lot.

In the years after the occupation of Suyangshan, Liu built a "military base" in Suyangshan to expand his weapons on the one hand; On the one hand, it expands its territory outwards and is armed with officials and bandits around it. For example, he eliminated the Jiangdonghai of the four households and the mouth of the river, and subdued the Xinglou and Huang Jiujiang.

At the same time, in order to curry favor with his master and repay his ambitions, Liu threw his main forces into anti-communism and anti-people. He attacked the anti-Japanese guerrilla base areas. For example, in the winter of 1944, Liu joined forces with the Japanese army and the crusade team of Hao Pengju, the puppet commissioner of Xuzhou, to attack the Tiefo area and committed a heinous crime. In August 1945, Liu joined forces with more than 1,000 recalcitrant bandits from Baji to attack the guerrilla forces of our militia in the Daishan area with the center of Jidun in all directions, slaughtered 22 people in a bloody day in Jingdun, looted and burned Jingdun Village, and arrested many villagers.

Through several years of painstaking management in Suyangshan, Liu Yanzhang's territory and influence have been expanded and consolidated day by day, and there are already nearly 1,000 well-equipped armed forces. It seems that he has become the soil emperor of this side of the landscape, wielding the military and political power of life and death in this area, asking for soldiers, food, and good land. His excuse for killing is very ingenious, and those who are killed are all named bandits, so that it is justified to kill, and there is no complaint for killing, and it can also win praise from the people who do not know the truth.

Because of his "outstanding achievements in war and politics", he was appointed by Hao Pengju, the puppet commissioner of Xuzhou, as the leader of the seventh detachment of the Huaihai Bandit Suppression. He himself was revered as a commander, and even his son Liu Shusheng was named a "small commander" and held military power.

After the surrender of the Japanese invaders, Liu Yanzhang, who was good at observing the climate, skillfully threw himself into the arms of the Kuomintang and was appointed as the commander of the newly formed fourth column of the Northern Jiangsu Advance Army, with the rank of lieutenant general. Today, Liu's power and status have been unprecedentedly satisfied. Even the illiterate grandfather and father, who had long been ancient, were also called "university scholars" and re-inscribed the inscription.

Because Liu Yanzhang had always been an enemy of the people, at the end of August 1945 (twenty-eight days after he attacked Jingdun Village), he was defeated by the old Fifth Regiment of our army, and after Suyang Mountain was conquered, he fled to Xuzhou. This announced that Liu's ambition had fallen from the peak to the deep valley, and his career history had come to an end. In early 1951, after Liu Yanzhang was arrested from Chongqing, he jumped into the river on the way to release him from custody, and his whereabouts are still unknown.

(Pixian Cultural and Historical Materials Volume II)