On November 26, 1914, I was born in Guojia Village, Lishan, northwest of Ji'an County, Jiangxi Province. It is a poor mountain village with only about 10 households, about 40 miles away from the county seat of Ji'an. His father is Guo Chaoxiu, and his mother is Liu. The family has only 3 houses and 2 acres of paddy fields, and their income is meager, so they have no food and clothing.
My mother gave birth to two boys and one girl, I am the eldest, my sister is the second, and my younger brother is the third. When I was just 6 years old, my mother passed away shortly after my brother was born. My father had to work and take care of the housework, so it was difficult to support the three of us, so he was forced to give his younger brother to someone else. In order to support the family, his father married his stepmother Mao.
My father was loyal, hardworking, simple, upright, and daring to fight. My father has been farming all his life and is a good farmer. Due to his poor family, when he was young, he worked as a long-term worker and odd job in Shibian Village, and others were willing to invite him. In addition to cultivating the land left by himself and his late uncle and uncle, my father also rented some of the land from others. In addition to paying rent and paying taxes every year, it was difficult to maintain the family's livelihood, so they had to borrow grain from the landlord, borrow one bucket to repay two buckets, and were exploited by usury. After the autumn harvest every year, in addition to borrowing grain, there is not much left, and I have to borrow again, year after year, Yin eats grain, and in the famine years, the days are even more difficult. I clearly remember that one year during the Spring Festival, the landlord had to pay the bill, the official family asked for taxes, and the rich people were lively and lively for the New Year, but our family was passing. On the night of the Chinese New Year's Eve, my father called the whole family together, saying that he wanted to see off my sister, but in fact, he carried his 3-year-old sister out and sold it in order to get money to pay off the debt. Since then, my sister has not been heard from. Whenever I think about it, my heart is sour, and I hate the dark old society.
When I was six or seven years old, I followed my father into labor, herding cattle, mowing grass, collecting firewood, working in the fields, and doing everything. When I was 10 years old, my father sent me to a foreign country to learn tailoring in order to learn some trades so that I could have a good life when I grew up. I have to pay two dollars to the master every year. During my apprenticeship, I had to collect firewood for the master's family during the day, do farm work, and watch the children, and the master taught me to make clothes at night. It's not a daily thing, but it's a regular thing. Sometimes when you encounter urgent work, you have to do three shifts in the middle of the night, and you can't rest if you can't finish it. No matter what you do, you have to be fast, if you are not fast, you can't do it, if you are slow, you will either be scolded or beaten, and in fact, you will become a servant of the master's family who does not spend money. I studied tailoring for two years, and I only learned how to sew clothes with a needle and thread, and nothing else. Once, I was very tired and had no energy to work, and I was beaten by my master again. That night, I stayed up all night, and after thinking about it, I couldn't stand it anymore and made up my mind to go. When he got up at dawn, he left the master's house. It was raining heavily on the way, but I didn't dare to run back to my house, so I ran to my uncle's house in my stepmother's village so that they couldn't find me. When my uncle saw that I had taken off my clothes, I was bruised and purple, and he also felt sorry for me and said don't go. I stayed at my uncle's house for 3 months and they couldn't find me anywhere. Approaching the end of the year, my uncle sent me home. When I told my father and mother about my apprenticeship, they were so upset that I never want to go to the apprenticeship again. Since then, my father and I have been herding cattle, farming, mowing grass, and collecting firewood at home, and often picking firewood with my father to Gujiangwei to sell to earn some money to buy oil and salt. I also became a laborer in my family. When I was 13 years old, my father was afraid that I would not be able to marry in the future, so he married me a seven or eight-year-old child daughter-in-law. After the peasant uprising, my family was scattered, and she had to go back to her home.
As early as 1923, there was an underground organization of the Communist Party in Ji'an, an old area with a glorious revolutionary tradition, and the seeds of revolution took root among the poor peasants. In August 1926, after the Northern Expeditionary Army conquered the county seat of Ji'an, under the excellent situation of the revolution, the party organizations sprung up like mushrooms after a rain. In Ji'an, the Communists once worked for the interests of the workers and peasants. After Chiang Kai-shek launched the April 12 coup d'état, the excellent situation of the workers' and peasants' revolution was suppressed. In the land of Ji'an, the seeds of revolution are buried deep in the hot soil, waiting for the opportunity to sprout and blossom. At that time, I was only 13 years old, and the story of the revolution that happened in Ji'an was rumored among adults from time to time, but I didn't know one thing or the other, and I didn't take it to heart. In October 1927, Mao Zedong led the team of the Autumn Harvest Uprising on the Hunan and Jiangxi borders to Jinggangshan. Then, in early April 1928, Zhu De and Mao Zedong met. Ji'an County, which is close to Jinggangshan, the holy land of the red revolution, is also boiling in the tide of revolution!
At the turn of the spring and summer of 1928, in our small mountain village, there was a story about the Red Army led by Zhu and Mao fighting local tyrants and dividing the land. In May and June, there were a few strangers in my house, and I only knew one of them, and that was my cousin Liu He. His family lives in Hetangxia Village. My cousin is about 30 years old, he is smart and capable, and he often runs martial arts fields abroad. My cousin and several others wore robes and coats, and carried out revolutionary activities under the cover of medical treatment. On that day, several people who came to my house mysteriously discussed things with my father. They were afraid that I would hear it, so my father deliberately told me to drink some wine and go to bed. But because of the hot and humid weather, I couldn't sleep at all while lying in bed, and I wondered what they were discussing? When I listened carefully, I realized that they were discussing the organization of a peasant uprising. After I heard this, I got up and walked up to them after a while, and they asked me what I heard? I deliberately said: I want to go to sleep after drinking, and I didn't hear anything. They will smile heartily.
One day in early September 1928, at about 9 o'clock in the evening, when people were busy Xi celebrating the "Sacrifice to the Nine Emperors" festival according to local customs, the men of the village gathered together, one or two dozen people, holding large knives, earthen guns, sticks and other weapons in their hands. My father carried a saber on his back (because my father had nightmares, and he heard that he would not have nightmares when he put a saber under his pillow, so he prepared a saber for this). What are they going to do? I suddenly remembered what my cousin and the gentlemen in robes and coats had said at my house not long ago, and I had already guessed what they were going to do! So, I deliberately asked my father, what are so many people doing? My father looked at me and said, "If you want to do a big thing, don't ask too much about children." I immediately said firmly, "I'm going too!" and my father never said anything to me again, and then said to everyone, "Go." And just like that, everyone went with him. I also took a stick in my hand and followed them.
Under the leadership of my father, everyone rushed to Wangjiashan Village, three or four miles away. When we were about to arrive at Wangjiashan Village, my cousin Liu He also arrived with people from Heshan Chong, and everyone gathered together, about three or four hundred people. Wangjiashan Village is a large village, with 100 families, and rich landlords live here. As soon as a few hundred of us entered Wangjiashan Village, we first surrounded an ancestral hall. The shouts of the people "Down with the local tyrants and inferior gentry", the firing of the earthen guns, and the scraping of the big knives on the wall sounded all over the place. At that time, my cousin and my father led a group of people into the ancestral hall, arrested several local tyrants and inferior gentry who were "worshipping the Nine Emperors" in the ancestral hall, and then dragged them outside the crowded ancestral hall to criticize and fight. This move greatly killed the prestige of the gentry and greatly increased the morale of the workers and peasants, and the people have never been so happy. Later, I wrote a limerick poem about the peasant uprising in southern Gansu:
The autumn harvest in southern Gannan was in September, and it was a good time for the peasants to revolt.
Armed with knives and sticks, defeat the local tyrants and avenge their grievances.
When I took part in the peasant uprising, although I did not understand revolutionary principles or Marxism-Leninism, I knew that for the sake of myself and the poor masses from exploitation and oppression, we needed to unite and carry out the struggle. Of course, the peasants rose up to revolution mainly under the influence and leadership of the party's underground organizations and revolutionary progressives.
After the peasant uprising, the village of Qiaoshang was followed by the establishment of the Township Soviet (also known as the Peasant Association) and elected my father as its chairman. After the establishment of the township soviets, they continued to carry out in-depth propaganda work and mobilize the masses to carry out revolutionary activities. The main propaganda is to eradicate feudalism, fight local tyrants, divide land, etc. I also participated in the revolutionary activities organized by the children, such as learning to sing the songs "Fighting the Local Tyrants and Dividing the Land without Mercy" and "Down with the Great Powers and Eliminate the Warlords".
The establishment of the new workers' and peasants' political power greatly boosted the morale of the poor workers and peasants and pierced the hearts of the Kuomintang reactionaries, who slashed at the revolutionary people with butcher's knives.
In January 1929, around the end of the day, Kuomintang troops drove from the county seat of Ji'an. They were aggressive, first surround the Soviet government of the village and township on the bridge, and conducted a search. They then surrounded Guojia Village and set fire to a three-story ancestral hall and some houses in the west of the village. They arrested, pelled, and killed pigs, and they turned over every house, smashing many things to pieces. Seeing this, I ran to a secluded place and hid. My father and several young people in the village were taken away by them. Later, my stepmother went to Ji'an to bail my father out, but she didn't expect the Kuomintang reactionaries to be so vicious, and my stepmother was also imprisoned. In March 1929, my father was killed by the enemy as the leader of a peasant uprising. The others who were captured were later killed. My father gave his life for the revolutionary cause of the proletariat, and I have always missed him very much.
In April 1976, after attending a meeting at the Changsha Railway Military and Political Cadres School in Hunan, I made a special trip back to my hometown in Jiangxi after a long absence. After visiting Jinggangshan, the comrades of the provincial military district sent a car to take us to Nanchang to live in the provincial military district. When I visited the Nanchang Revolutionary Martyrs Memorial Hall, I saw my father's name on the list of martyrs in the exhibition room. My father went down in history as a revolutionary martyr. His father's blood was not shed in vain, and his immortal achievements will always be admired and commemorated by future generations. This gave me great comfort and excitement. But there is one more thing: my father was the backbone of the peasant uprising at that time, but whether he was a Communist Party member or not? At that time, the organization of the Party was secret, and no one except the insiders of the organization knew about it. In my mind, this matter has always been a suspense.
After the Kuomintang reactionaries killed my father, they released my stepmother from prison. Since I was also part of the riot, they threatened to "cut down the grass and eradicate the roots", and they had to catch me. My father had already been killed, and they refused to let me go, and this filled me with grief and indignation, and the fire of hatred burned in my chest! But in that dark society, what could I, a 14-year-old child, do? In order to avoid the limelight, I first went to the house of a relative in Qiukang Village to stay temporarily. Who knows, a few days later, somehow leaked the news, one night, a few plainclothes people broke into Qiukang Village and asked the people in the village to hand me over. He also threatened the villagers and said, "If you don't know about it, the crime will be added to the crime." It was under the cover of the kind folks that I survived. After the guys left, the villagers advised me to get out of here as soon as possible, otherwise the enemy would come and arrest me. When I heard this, I was very anxious. I know that the villagers are for my good, and I also know that the villagers are afraid of being implicated. However, it was raining heavily, and in this stormy night, where could I go? There was really no way to go to heaven and no way to enter the earth!
I thought about it and thought of my cousin Liu He. So he decided to go to Hetangxia Village to find him in order to find a way out of danger. There are more than ten miles of road from Qiukang Village to Hetangxia Village, and all of them are mountain roads, and the road is slippery on rainy nights, and the difficulties can be imagined. Especially on the way, I have to pass a mountain, there is a broken temple on the mountain, and it is said that the temple is often haunted, and there are robbers, thinking of this, I am even more scared. But in order to get out of danger, in order not to let the villagers be affected, I had to go. So I mustered up the courage to say goodbye to my fellow villagers, put on my hat, and braved the rain in the dead of night to hit the road. After walking out of the 3-mile road, I arrived at the back hill of Xinwuchang Village, where the forests and wild grasses on both sides of the mountain road were dense, especially the strange birds that were attacked by the wind and rain and howled were really frightening. When I walked to the ruined temple, I was even more frightened, and my hairs stood on end, as if there was some ghost in front of me. But thinking of my father's deep hatred, and thinking that the enemy might still be chasing me from behind, I gritted my teeth and continued to walk forward. After walking this eerie and terrifying mountain road and stepping on the ridge road in the open area, I felt that a stone in my heart had fallen to the ground and was much easier.
When I walked to my cousin's house, it was already dawn, and I felt tired and weak. When my aunt and cousin saw that I was covered in mud and water, and my clothes were soaked, they asked me what had happened to me. When my aunt heard this, she couldn't suppress her intense grief and indignation, and cried a lot. My cousin made me change my clothes, and my aunt gave me a hot meal. When I finished eating, my cousin said, "It's not safe here, so you better go to a safer place." As soon as I heard this, my heart suddenly became even more frightened, and I thought to myself, where else could I go? I was really homeless, and I couldn't vote for my relatives! I thought about it and knew that my aunt was worried about my safety, and that my cousin was anxious about me. I remembered that my cousin had participated in the peasant revolt with my father, and that the landlords and wealthy people would not let him go, and that he himself was in danger, so he said, "It's not safe here." My cousin, seeing that I was burdened with thoughts, advised me, "Don't be afraid, be brave." I will write a letter to you, and you should bring the letter to Changdong and Futian to find an organization called the 'Beilu Office', and the person who slipped away will receive you when he sees the letter. "I believe what my cousin said.
With the letter written by my cousin, I went on my way again, and went to the office in Northern Lu according to the address my cousin said. I've never been far away, and this time I'm walking alone, like a lonely goose. Along the way, when you are thirsty, you will get some water to drink from the ditch or rice field next to the road, and when you are hungry, you will ask for some food from kind uncles and aunts. After many twists and turns, the "North Luxe Office" was finally found. It's like a compound where the landlord's family lives, and there are many people working in it, and people are constantly coming and going. There was a wooden sign at the entrance of the courtyard with words on it, because I was illiterate and didn't know what to write. When I inquired, this was the North Urwi office. As soon as I entered the door, I met a man who saw that I was a child and asked me, "Is there anything wrong?" and I said, "I have a letter to be handed over to this person." "He took the letter and read it, and then asked about it, and I told me what happened to my family. After hearing this, he said, "You have found the right place, this is the place your cousin wants you to find, don't be afraid." He received me warmly and arranged room and board for me. From then on, I ended my hard and bumpy childhood, began to step on the threshold of the revolution, and had a place to "settle down".
Not long after I left my cousin's house, the Kuomintang reactionaries went to Hetangxia Village, killed my cousin's entire family, and set the village on fire.
[Guo Yanlin, a native of Ji'an County, Jiangxi Province, joined the guerrillas in 1929, joined the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army in 1930, joined the Communist Youth League, transferred to the Communist Party of China in 1932, and was awarded the rank of major general in 1961. He used to be the deputy political commissar of the railway soldiers. 】