Chen Wenlong, the ancestor of the Chen clan in Zhanjiang Yuhu, has repeatedly saved the people from shipwrecks and built water conservancy to help the people

In Fujian, Taiwan and Southeast Asia, there has always been a saying, "Official ships worship Shangshu, and civilian ships worship Mazu". This Shangshu is Chen Wenlong, who has been canonized as the "Shangshu of The Ministry of Water" three times.

Chen Wenlong was posthumously honored by successive dynasties. In the first year of Ming Hongwu (1368), Chen Wenlong was enfeoffed with Fuzhou and Putian Chenghuang. The three emperors Hongwu, Yongle, and Chongzhen all posthumously honored him as the "Shu of Shuibu". Emperor Mingwu ordered the construction of the Chen Zhongsu Ancestral Hall. Qing Kangxi crowned him the god of the sea, and Qianlong crowned him "King of zhenhai". In Chinese history, Chen Wenlong was the only one who was named a god and a national hero by the emperor.

However, Chen Wenlong did not serve as a Shangshu, and there was no water department among the six departments of the imperial court. The reason why he was named the Shangshu of The Ministry of Water is because of the folklore that Chen Wenlong saved the people from shipwrecks many times.

Historical records are the stories of his construction of water conservancy and the village of Sawa. In the tenth year of Xianchun (1274), Chen Wenlong dismissed his official and returned to his hometown because he had offended Jia Xiangdao.

Feeling that his father and elder in his hometown had suffered from drought and flood disasters and were living a life of upheaval and displacement, Chen Wenlong decided to advocate water conservancy.

So he mobilized thousands of people to dredge, widen and deepen the dilapidated harbor road.

During this time, Chen Wenlong sold words to raise funds, and his wife donated jewelry... Under his own practice, the dredging and excavation of the harbor road at that time was seven zhang wide and two zhang deep, and the flood control embankment on both sides was three zhang wide, winding for dozens of miles, converging the waters of the three lakes of the east, west and north and the seventy-two oceans of Dongfeng Mountain.

The water network passes through 183 villages in Beixiang, and more than 100,000 mu of farmland are benefited by it, and boats travel back and forth, through the territory and beyond.

The father and fellow villagers thanked Chen Wenlong's kindness and changed the name of "Qiantang Port" to "Chen Tang Port".

Guangdong Zhanjiang Potou Wei Shangshu Temple

Most of the Chen surnames in Zhanjiang are descendants of the anti-Yuan national hero Chen Wenlong and Chen Chaofeng's uncles and nephews, and during the Southern Song Dynasty, the Chen family of Putian Yuhu migrated to Zhanjiang on a large scale. Chen Wenlong's descendants traveled south from Fujian to Zhanjiang.