Liang Huanyi (1876-1946), zi Dingfu, a native of Xiangtan County, was a famous industrialist.
Liang Huanyi was the younger brother of Liang Huankui (once known as the God of Southern Wealth, along with Yuan Shikai's money bag Liang Shiyi). In the twenty-fifth year of Guangxu (1899), Liang Huanyi, who was born as a child under the old-style imperial examination, entered the middle school class of Nanyang Public School in Shanghai under the arrangement of his brother, and entered the Hangzhou Japanese School the following year. In the twenty-seventh year of Guangxu (1901), he was sent to Japan by the official fee of the Hunan Provincial Bureau of Mining to study in Tokyo, and studied at The Chengcheng High School in Tokyo, where he was classmates with Cai Yi and others. In the 28th year of Guangxu (1902), Liang Huanyi co-founded the Hunan Compilation Society and the Youxue Compilation Society, and jointly compiled and published the "Youxue Translation and Compilation" with Huang Xing, Yang Du, Yang Yulin, etc., actively promoting the ideas of national independence and democratic revolution. After studying at Chengcheng Middle School in Japan for three years, Liang returned to Changsha in the early 30th year of Guangxu (1904).
Shortly after the Spring Festival of the 30th year of Guangxu (1904), Liang Huanyi and his brother Liang Huankui invited twelve celebrities in Xiangzhong, including Long Furui, Chen Baoyi, Tan Yanmin, and Wei Zhaowen, to publish "Raising Donations for the Establishment of Hunan Library and Education Museum" on March 15 (the 29th day of the first lunar month) in Hunan Guanbao No. 593. "Fundraising Qi" was praised and funded by Zhao Erxun, the inspector of Hunan Province, and all sectors of society. With the approval of the Hunan Provincial Academic Affairs Office, the Hunan Library was officially opened in the second month of the lunar calendar of that year.
Dingwangtai Hunan Library
Shortly after Liang Xuanyi returned from Japan, due to his excellent studies, he was sent to the United States to study at the official expense of the Hunan Provincial Bureau of Mining. In the thirty-second year of Guangxu (1906), he was admitted to the Royal College of Mines in London for further study, specializing in antimony, tungsten, copper and tin mining engineering. During his study in the UK, he often used his vacation to visit mines and refineries in Various European countries to search for new methods of antimony refining.
In the thirty-fourth year of Guangxu (1908), Liang Huanyi purchased Heronsmead's patent for distilling and antimony from Paris, France, and traveled all over Britain and France, drawing and designing, and customizing the refining furnace equipment. After returning to China, in order to expand the scale of production, the Liang brothers decided to increase the capital of the shares and formally established Huachang Antimony Refining Company. Liang Huankui is the chairman of the board, and Liang Huanyi is in charge of engineering technology in the name of a director.
Huachang Refining Antimony Company
In the second year of Xuanun (1910), Liang Huankui was hired by Shen Fangbo, a nursing home in Yunnan, to establish the pure antimony refinery of Baohua Company; in the third year of Xuanun (1911), he was hired by Li Jingxili, the governor of Yunnan-Guizhou, to preside over the development of Yunnan mining affairs, concurrently run an industrial and mining school, and was sent to the United States to investigate copper mines for several months. After returning to China from the United States, he was hired as the assistant of an old tin mining company, the principal of the industrial and mining school, and the director of the laboratory; in 1913, Hui Xiang became the director of the Shuikoushan Mining Bureau; in 1915, the Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce was hired as a member of the industrial group, went to the United States to visit the World Exposition, and returned after several months of travel. Director of Cishuikou mountain, specializing in Huachang's expansion of Western French refining.
After the end of the First World War, Huachang Company was in internal and external difficulties and declared bankruptcy, and Liang Huanyi was deeply devastated. In 1925, Liang Huanyi became the director of the Industrialization Laboratory of the Hunan Construction Department and advised the director of the workshop. Xuan was shot and killed because his eldest son, Liang Peiying (Zi Junwu), studied in the United States and converted to Buddhism from the old monk of Mingyin.
In 1932, Liang Huanyi's second son Liang Peiwei (Zi Junda) and his wife, liang Huanyi, who were sent to Liang Huankui as sons, were arrested in Changsha for joining the Maple Leaf Literary and Art Society, a peripheral organization of the Communist Party of China, and in order to rescue their own sons and daughters-in-law who were imprisoned on death row, Liang Huanyi still had to raise huge sums of money and bribe judge Li Qun, which eventually led to the ruin of the family. Forced to make a living, in 1935, Liang Huanyi became a technician in the Construction Department of Jiangxi Province, presiding over the establishment of the Taihe Tungsten Mine. Later, he was changed to a technician in the Tungsten Industry Management Office of the State Resources Commission, and the director of the Twelfth Office, presiding over the establishment of qiannan tungsten mine. In 1937, he resolutely resigned as the director of the Twelve Offices and went to Hunan Tungsten Branch as an engineer in the Tin Inspection Machine Factory. After the "Wenxi Fire" in Changsha in 1938, he was dismissed from his post and returned home when the tin inspection machine factory was relocated.
Due to the Japanese army's advance into Changsha, in 1939, Liang Huanyi fled to Nanyue with his family, and soon after stayed in the countryside of Lingling. By the spring of 1942, he led his family to move to Yizhang, and presided over the supervision of Anyuan and Yaogangxian mining affairs. Because both mines had already entrusted people, they had to live in the Yizhang Anyuan Tin Mine temporarily, immerse themselves in Buddhist studies, and mainly chant the Sutras every day.
After the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, Liang Huanyi led his family back to Changsha in early 1946. Soon Liang Huanyi died of cerebral hemorrhage at the age of 70.
bibliography:
[1] Liang Jianxiong, Liang Gang: "The Pioneer of Nonferrous Metal Mining in China - Liang Huanyi".
[2] Tan Zhongchi, editor-in-chief: Changsha General History and Modern Volumes, Hunan Education Publishing House, 2013.
[3] Compiled by the Documentation Compilation Committee for the Fifty Years of the Founding of the Republic of China: "Fifty Years of the Founding of the Republic of China" (Part 1), "The Origin of Revolution and Revolutionary Movement" (Vol. 8) (Reform and Reaction of the Qing Court, Part II), Central Cultural Relics Supply Society, 1965 edition.
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