Although the first wave of Japanese attacks in the Battle of Xuzhou was successfully blocked by the Fifth Theater led by Li Zongren, Han Fuyu's subsequent retreat without a fight had an extremely bad impact on the entire Xuzhou war situation.
Without the defense of Han Fuyu's troops, our army would have lost a defensive position. The Japanese army took this opportunity to attack all the way, such as entering no man's land, after the successive losses of Jinan and Qingdao, TengXian became the last military town in Xuzhou that could serve as a defense.
If Tengxian is lost, the next situation will be very unfavorable to our army, and the follow-up battle plan will be difficult to carry out. At this time, Tengxian became a battlefield of great attention, and the importance of Tengxian's attack and defense to the Japanese army and our army was self-evident. In order to be able to hold Teng County, Li Zongren transferred the 22nd Group Army formed by the Sichuan Army to Teng County for liberation.
After receiving the order, the morale of the soldiers of the Sichuan Army was very high, and they knew that their task was very heavy, and the impact of the overall situation was at stake, but it was precisely because of the heavy task that their fighting spirit was fully stimulated.
Guard Teng County
After receiving orders to guard Teng County, Deng Xihou transferred the 41st Army and the 45th Army under the 22nd Group Army to Lincheng and Teng County to prepare for the defense.
However, because Deng Xihou was soon transferred back to Sichuan, the 22nd Army was under the command of Deputy Commander-in-Chief Sun Zhendai. Wang Mingzhang was appointed by Sun Zhen as the commander of the second line to guard Teng County, and also served as the commander-in-chief of the front of the 22nd Group Army, commanding the 41st Army and the 45th Army.
Wang Mingzhang was a man with very rich combat experience, he began to fight in his twenties, and he was already in his forties when tengxian defended the war.
Among these combat experiences, the experience of guard warfare is particularly rich, and Sun Zhen took a fancy to him, so he appointed him as the commander-in-chief. This time, their mission was to cast an iron wall of copper and never let the Japanese army occupy Teng County.
On March 14, 1938, the sky was not yet fully lit, the ground was gray, and the Japanese army had begun to attack. Under the cover of heavy firepower such as aircraft, artillery, and tanks, nearly 10,000 Japanese cavalry were charging.
The Japanese army wanted to rely on the advantages of weapons and equipment to crush the defense of Tengxian in one fell swoop, without giving the Sichuan army any time to breathe, and occupy Tengxian county, so as not to have too many dreams in the night.
Although the equipment of the Sichuan army was replenished before the battle, the quality of the weapons was not as good as the sophisticated equipment of the Japanese army. This cannot be denied; in modern warfare, weapons have always been a disadvantageous position, but we have used bad weapons to defeat the invaders and defend our homeland.
The only advantage of the Sichuan army was to occupy a good defensive position first. Because of the rudimentary guns, the Sichuan army waited for the Japanese army to approach the position before launching a counterattack. In this way, they can maximize the role of their weapons, but because the distance from the enemy is shortened, their own security guarantees are greatly reduced.
After the fierce battle on the first day, although local positions such as Xiangcheng, Xiaguanbu, Baishan, and Huangshan were occupied by the Japanese army, the main frontal positions on the front line of Jiehe Town were still controlled by our army.
Sun Zhen was originally stationed in Lincheng, but as soon as he received the report of the Japanese attack on Tengxian, he immediately took a train to Tengxian to inspect the situation in person. He also told the commanders below that as long as the 41st Army held Teng County for three days, reinforcements would come to consolidate the defense of Xuzhou together.
The best defense is offense
The Japanese army, which had invested strong firepower and huge troops, still could not conquer the battlefield of Tengxian for a long time, which somewhat annoyed the Japanese army. Because they are not facing a male lion who is well-armed.
At that time, the atomic bomb had not yet been developed, there were no super-large-scale weapons of destruction on the battlefield, and even if it was very well equipped, it increased the probability of winning many wars, but it had not yet reached the point of rewriting the battlefield.
As a result, on March 15, the Japanese army began to increase the strength of the battlefield. On the first day, the Japanese attack was extremely fierce, and although our army held it, we also knew that the first day was just an appetizer, and the feast was still to come.
Lincheng, where Sun Zhen sat next door, was not attacked by japanese troops, so only a special service battalion was tasked with guarding. The Special Service Battalion has a total of three infantry companies and one pistol company. Now Sun Zhen had sent all three infantry companies over, leaving only one pistol company there. But despite this, in the face of the next fierce attack of the Japanese army, it was only a drop in the bucket.
Later, one of the battalions of the 727th Regiment was temporarily commanded by the 127th Division, and the regimental commander led the rest of the troops to Tengxian county to lay out the defense. After this unit arrived in Teng County, Wang Mingzhang told the regimental commander about the defense of the city, and then hurried to the front line to command.
On March 16, our army launched an offensive, led by Tan Shangxiu, commander of the 746th Regiment, and led the soldiers into the enemy camp and engaged in fierce street battles with the enemy. Their task was to guard Teng County and hold the enemy back.
If you have been deploying and guarding the city, the enemy's heavy weapons are really difficult to resist. Therefore, simply turning passive into active, street battles and hand-to-hand combat with the enemy can make the enemy's heavy weapons useless.
After a day and a night of bitter fighting, casualties on both sides were particularly serious. Several enemy attacks were also repelled by the defenders with grenades. Of the fighters who rushed into the enemy camp, only more than 360 broke through, less than half of them entered. But this war is not over, and they need to continue fighting after a little consolidation.
On March 17, the Japanese reinforced more than 300 people at Xiadian and bombarded the Guoshan position with more than a dozen cannons in the afternoon. The unusually fierce fighting began again.
Vow to die
In the face of the enemy's unreasonable firepower, the city wall of TengXian was finally broken. The Sichuan army guarding Teng County retreated again and again, looking for a place in the city to defend against the counterattack, thinking that it would be able to negotiate with the Japanese army for a while. At this time, it was time for the reinforcements to arrive, but the Sichuan army did not see the sound of reinforcements for a long time, that is, the eyes were pierced and did not see.
In the evening, the sun gradually sets in the west and the sky gradually darkens. Wang Mingzhang himself knew in his heart that the Japanese army had broken through the city pass, they no longer had any defensive advantage, reinforcements had not yet arrived, and this battle...
Wang Mingzhang sent a final telegram to Sun Zhen: "On the evening of the 17th, our reinforcements have not yet arrived. The enemy's large army rushed into the city, that is, the troops left by the governor, and fought a final bloody battle with the enemy. ”
Maybe Wang Mingzhang knew that this battle was their failure, which was an impossible task, but even if it was impossible, he had to try again, and the duty of a soldier was to carry out orders until the last moment of his life! Wang Mingzhang came to the intersection in the center of the county and continued to command the remaining troops to fight the Japanese army, delaying the time of the Japanese army.
After that, Wang Mingzhang went to Xiguan Station to organize troops to continue the defense. When he arrived near the Xiguan Electric Light Factory, Wang Mingzhang was hit by intensive Japanese fire and was shot in the abdomen and fell to the ground. The warriors next to him lifted him up, and Wang Mingzhang knew that he was about to die, and his last words were still: "Resist, resist, and hold teng county!" He then committed suicide by drinking bullets.
The seriously injured warriors in the city also followed wang Mingzhang's example, preferring to die unyieldingly, and one after another blew themselves up with grenades and sacrificed themselves heroically. Under the stubborn resistance of all the fighters of the Sichuan Army, it was not until March 18 that Tengxian was occupied by the Japanese army. The Sichuan army had done a good job, dragging the enemy for more than three days, but in the end they could not wait for the arrival of reinforcements.
brief summary:
Later, in recognition of the heroic deeds of the 122nd Division, the Nationalist government not only erected a monument to commemorate the merits, but also posthumously awarded Wang Mingzhang the rank of general. When the mourning ceremony was held in Wuhan, Chiang Kai-shek also handed over the link: "Carrying out the work to defend the family state, not returning the ambition, fighting to be loyal to ningZhou; hearing the drums and thinking of the general, the national martyrs cry together, and the bearers of the standard relics are purged of the high."
The Communist Party also sent representatives to participate, and Chairman Mao and others jointly presented the league: "Fighting and defending an isolated city and treating death as a homecoming is the true color of revolutionary soldiers; they are determined to annihilate the stubborn enemy, martyr the country with their bodies, and add glory to the Chinese nation." ”