In January 1929, Chiang Kai-shek gathered a total of 18 regiments of reactionary garrisons in Xianggan and Gansu provinces, with Lu Diping as the commander-in-chief, He Jian as the acting commander-in-chief, and Jin Handing as the deputy commander-in-chief.
In order to break the enemy's "meeting and suppression" and also to solve the economic difficulties of the troops, on January 14, Chairman Mao, Zhu De, and Chen Yi led the main force of the Red 4th Army of more than 3,600 people, starting from Xiaoxingzhou, going down to Jinggang in the wind and snow, and attacking Gannan Province.
Among this team were the two main regiments of the Red 4th Army, the Red 28th Regiment and the Red 31st Regiment.
The Red 28th Regiment was reorganized from the 1st Division of the former Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army (the remnants of the Nanchang Uprising), and was the number one main force in the Red Army at Jinggangshan, and its regimental commander was Lin Biao. The Red 31st Regiment was reorganized from the First Regiment of the First Division of the First Army of the former Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army (the remnants of the Autumn Harvest Uprising), and its combat effectiveness was second only to that of the Red 28th Regiment in the Jinggangshan Red Army, and its regimental commander was Wu Zhonghao.
On January 23, 1929, the Red 4th Army occupied the county seat of Dayu in Jiangxi.
The downhill tiger is really powerful.
After breakfast on January 24, the Red 4 Army headquarters and the Red 31 Regiment, the Special Agent Battalion and the Independent Battalion under their jurisdiction went deep into the city and outside the city to do mass work and raise materials in accordance with the deployment. Suddenly, gunfire was loud, and enemy situations appeared in the direction of LuAnting and Lei Gongtang in the north of the county seat.
It turned out that he Jian, commander-in-chief of the Kuomintang "Huijiao" Jinggangshan, learned that the main force of the Red Army was descending the mountain, and immediately pulled out two brigades of Li Wenbin and Liu Shiyi from the five lines of the "Hui suppression" Red Army to chase the Red Army, and at the same time ordered Wang Qiyu of Guangdong to intercept the Red Army at the junction of Nanxiong and Gansu and Guangdong.
At that time, the Red 28 Regiment was responsible for guard work. Due to the negligence of regimental commander Lin Biao,--there was no organization of cadres at and above the battalion and company level to look at the terrain, nor to study the coordination and cooperation in complex situations, coupled with the lack of cooperation from local party organizations, the red 28 regiment's police cordon was useless, so there was a sudden appearance of the enemy.
The cordon was quickly breached by the enemy, and the regimental commander Lin Biao wanted to organize the whole regiment to retreat. He Tingying, a representative of the Regiment Party, resolutely opposed the retreat and personally led his troops to launch a counterattack against the enemy.
Soon, He Tingying was seriously injured and carried off the line of fire by the soldiers.
At that time, Chen Yi was distributing goods to the masses in the streets of Dayu City, and it turned out that the enemy army had retreated in a hurry, chasing until it reached the edge of the city before catching up with the retreating military headquarters, and at that time only Chairman Mao and a few organ personnel were left in the military headquarters.
At the moment of the first attack, Zhu De, commander of the Red 4th Army, who was in the 31st Regiment, ordered the regiment commander Wu Zhonghao to lead the 31st Regiment to seize the commanding heights of Dongshanling in the eastern suburbs of the city and resist desperately.
In order to preserve the strength to withdraw from the battle, Chairman Mao and Zhu De retreated with the 31st Regiment. During the transfer, they were still constantly surrounded by the enemy. He Tingying, a seriously wounded party representative of the Red 28 Regiment, and the wounded and sick team members encountered the enemy in the mountains and forests, and died heroically in the battle.
In addition, in this battle, Song Qiaosheng, former member of the COMMITTEE, director of the Workers' and Peasants' Movement Committee, and director of the Ordnance Department, Zhou Fang, commander of the 31st Regiment, Zhang Wei, commander of the Independent Battalion, Zheng Te, commander of the 28th Regiment's Special Agent Company, and many other cadres died, and the Red Army soldiers also sacrificed more than 100 people, causing considerable losses.
Who knows that misfortune is not alone, within a week, and then dangerous situations.
On February 1, the Red 4th Army stayed overnight in Zhenxia Village, Jitan Town, Xunwu County. Zhenxia Village, surrounded by mountains on all sides, is a narrow east-west section and a small river in the middle. After the Red 4th Army entered the village, the military headquarters was stationed in wenchang Pavilion in the center of the village and a large earthen enclosure, and the two main regiments, the Red 28th Regiment and the Red 31st Regiment, were arranged to guard the military headquarters in front of and behind the village.
At dawn on February 2, Lin Biao led the Red 28th Regiment to advance the military headquarters, and its actions were not notified to the military department.
At this time, a regiment of the vanguard of the enemy Liu Shiyi's troops suddenly attacked, and the Red 4th Army headquarters stationed in Zhenxia Village was surrounded by it. Suddenly, gunshots rang out from all sides, and the situation was extremely critical.
Chairman Mao and He Zizhen, covered by guards, waded across the river and broke through the mountain.
Zhu De, the commander of the Red 4 Army, carried a submachine gun and the guards to kill a bloody road, but wu Ruolan, who had been married for less than a year and was pregnant with him, was unfortunately arrested because of a bullet in the leg. (Wu Ruolan was brave, and led the enemy to herself in order to cover for Zhu De, and after being wounded, she lay on the ground and shot at the enemy, and was later brutally killed in the Ganzhou Wei Mansion.) The cruel enemy cut off his head and hung it on the gates of Ganzhou for public display. ）
Chen Yi, director of the Political Department of the Red 4th Army, was caught in the middle of the breakthrough by the enemy who suddenly rushed up, and he was in a hurry to take off his coat and cover the enemy's head before he could escape.
The three giants of the Red Army were in danger twice in a week and their lives were hanging in the balance, which shows the difficult environment of our army's initial struggle.
If they fail to overcome the danger, the history of our Party and our army may be rewritten.
Zhenxia Village was in distress, which was the most serious difficulty encountered by the Red 4th Army after it went down to Jinggangshan. The troops suffered heavy losses, the officers and men starved and starved, and there was no place to rest, the wounded increased sharply, but there was no place to place them, the ammunition was exhausted and could not be replenished, and morale was quite low. Chairman Mao said in his report to the Central Committee on March 20 that "it was the most difficult time for our army."
These two encounters were caused by the mistakes of Lin Biaozhi, who was in charge of vigilance. Later, Lin Biao was very cautious, fought more and more refined battles, and became one of the most powerful commanders of our army.
Talents have all grown up in actual combat.
He Tingying, who was seriously wounded and killed on the way to the battle of Dayu, was a native of Zheng County, Hanzhong, Shaanxi, and had a high status in the early Red Army. As early as the reorganization of Sanwan, He Tingying was a party representative of the 1st Regiment of the 4th Division of the Workers' and Peasants' Revolution and a party representative of the 3rd Battalion. In March 1928, the Committee of Former Enemies of the Autumn Harvest Uprising was reorganized into the Division Party Committee, with He Tingying as secretary (the partner of the division commander was Chairman Mao).
If He Tingying could have lived to be awarded the rank in 1955, if he had still worked in the army, his rank would have been either marshal or general.
The writer Chen Zhongzhong wrote this after visiting Jinggangshan in 2006: "What I did not expect was that He Tingying, one of the two top commanders of the Huangyang Boundary Guard War, was my Shaanxi Township Party. I am already familiar with the names of martyrs such as Liu Zhidan, who became popular in Guanzhong, Shaanxi and northern Shaanxi, but I have hardly heard of He Tingying. In the early days from the Autumn Harvest Uprising to the Jinggangshan Revolutionary Base Area, He Tingying fought with Mao Zedong and became a division commander, and if he had not died young, what a leading figure he would have been. ”
Wu Ruolan, who was wounded in the next battle and was captured and heroically sacrificed, was also a great hero. She can write and fight, and she is good at making two guns. Wu Ruolan was only 26 years old when he died, and not even a single photo was left.
When the bad news came out, Zhu De looked up at the sky and sighed, crying like rain, and his heart was extremely painful. He said sadly: "She is excellent in propaganda and eloquence, on war, wisdom and courage, such a woman is rare!" ”
Although Wu Ruolan sacrificed, her noble and selfless qualities and heroic and fearless image were forever imprinted in the depths of Zhu De's soul, and the Red Army and the people of Jinggangshan praised her as "the orchid that never withers on Jinggangshan".
Marshal Zhu De loved orchids all his life and expressed his deep remembrance of his deceased wife Wu Ruolan forever. (Liu Jixing)