In 1991, Wang Zhen received a letter, and the person who sent the letter was Ma Xing. Ma Xing was once a soldier of the 359th Brigade, and Wang Zhen was his old leader, but the two had not been in contact for many years.

In 1991, Wang Zhen received a letter, and the person who sent the letter was Ma Xing. Ma Xing was once a soldier of the 359th Brigade, and Wang Zhen was his old leader, but the two had not been in contact for many years. Seeing this letter, Wang Zhen guessed that the other party must have something important. After reading the contents of the letter, Wang Zhen realized that the other party hoped that he could testify for the fact that the army borrowed 1,000 dan of grain from a landlord.

As we all know, the Communist troops never take every needle and thread from the people. If there is really a need, they will not be taken away in vain. Instead, they will leave behind an IOU and repay it in the future. After the founding of New China in , if we had funded our party’s army before, we could get the supplies back with the IOU. But this landlord only brought up this matter many years later, and General Wang Zhen needed to testify. What exactly happened to him?

The 359th Brigade, which was exhausted from ammunition and food,

Speaking of the 359th Brigade, I believe many people are very familiar with it. When the main force of the Red Army was reorganized into the Eighth Route Army in 1937, the Sixth Army, the 32nd Army and the former General Special Forces were reorganized into the 359th Brigade. After that, under the leadership of brigade commander Chen Bojun, the 359th Brigade has been stationed in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region. Later, due to the need of the war of resistance, Deputy Brigade Commander Wang Zhen led some troops of the 359th Brigade to the Shanxi frontline to fight against Japan.

In January 1938, Wang Zhen officially served as the brigade commander of the 359th Brigade. Under his leadership, the 359th Brigade repeatedly damaged the enemy on the battlefield of the Anti-Japanese War. During this period, the size of the troops continued to expand, with the entire brigade reaching more than 12,000 troops, and it had extremely strong combat power. However, as the Kuomintang began to turn its fingers to our army, in October 1939, the 359th Brigade had to withdraw from the Anti-Japanese Front to the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region to be responsible for the guarding work.

At that time, our army was short of materials. In order to change this situation, the 359th Brigade, led by Wang Zhen, launched a production campaign in the Nanniwan area. Nanniwan is located in the southeast of Yan'an. The land there was originally very barren, but with the efforts of the soldiers for two years, Nanniwan became very rich, and this incident has also been praised as a good story. However, shortly after that, the 359th Brigade was divided into two. One of the troops was led by Wang Zhen to go south, first met with the 5th Division of the New Fourth Army in Hubei, and then continued to go south to Nanxiong area, Guangdong, and the other troops went to Henan to participate in the anti-Japanese war.

After the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, the detachment led by Wang Zhen restored the number of the 359th Brigade. Although the Japanese invaders have been driven away, the Kuomintang troops are eyeing our army. At that time, Chiang Kai-shek pretended to seek a plan for peaceful coexistence between the two parties during the Chongqing negotiations, but in fact, they arranged a large army to surround our troops to prepare in advance for the subsequent civil war. By September 1945, the Kuomintang troops had gathered around the Central Plains liberated areas of our army. If they could not be transferred in advance, the situation of the troops would be very critical.

Fortunately, the Party Central Committee discovered the enemy's intention in time, and immediately ordered Wang Zhen to lead the troops north to join with other troops in the Central Liberated Area, and then look for opportunities to break the deadlock. Finally, the troops that met established Central Plains Military Region , and Wang Zhen served as deputy commander and chief of staff.

Since then, our army and the Kuomintang troops have fought repeatedly, and have won many victories during this period. However, the enemy's army has far exceeded our army, and it has formed an encirclement trend early, which is very unfavorable. Under such circumstances, the Central Military Region troops can only be forced to transfer and seek a breakthrough. During this period, Wang Zhen led the 359th Brigade to conquer Zaoyang , and then led the troops to the Huantan Town area to repair, waiting for further instructions from the central government.

At that time, the troops were exhausted due to their days of fighting with the Kuomintang army. What was even more troublesome was that they were surrounded by the enemy, and the logistics supply had long been cut off by the enemy, and the troops had no food. The lack of food has made the army's morale depressed. Wang Zhen knew very well that if the problem of military rations could not be solved, the army would probably be ruined here. So he contacted Li Shi, a commissioner of the North Hubei Administrative Office, hoping that he could help think of a solution.

Although Li Shi is a local administrative official, he has no choice, because the North Hubei Administration has just been established and its foundation is not stable in the local area, and there is no supplies in his hands, and there is no connections.It is even harder to get Li Shi to raise the food needed by the army in a short time than to climb to the sky. But the life and death of the troops were hanging on the front line. Li Shi knew that he had no time to waste. Just when he was in a state of great anxiety, he thought of someone, and he also decided to go there to try his luck to see if he could borrow enough food.

One thousand dan of grain

The person Li Shi thought of was the richest man in Huantan Town. The Liao family has been operating salt for many years and has a lot of wealth. The Liao family also has the strength to take out the grain needed by the troops. In addition, during the Anti-Japanese War, the Liao family invested in supporting a series of anti-Japanese activities. Although the Japanese have been beaten away and the enemy of our party has become the Kuomintang, Li Shi was not sure whether the Liao family would support our army, but when something urgent happened, he had no better choice.

The head of the Liao family at that time was Liao Fuchu, but Li Shi knew very well that his grandmother, Old Lady Mao, was the real person in the family. In that era, most women had no say, but Old Lady Mao was different. Without her, the Liao family would not have become the richest man in Huantan Town, and her experience was also legendary.

Mrs. Old lady Mao was born into a local landlord family. Her parents attached great importance to her education. She read poetry and prose when she was young. She was a famous talented woman. Later she married into the Liao family and was very virtuous and loved by the family. However, at that time, the Liao family had no industry, but ordinary landlords, and their main source of income was rent collection, and Old Lady Mao basically did not participate in family affairs.

But in 1882, the fate of the Liao family took a turning point. At that time, an Italian missionary came to Huantan Town. Old Mrs. Mao’s husband Liao Linxuan has always been a Catholic believer. He took the initiative to contact each other and both sides became friends. Later, at the invitation of the other party, he came to Yingcheng, Hubei to preach. Here, Liao Linxuan met a miner named Xu. He was plagued by the lawsuit at that time, and finally Liao Linxuan and the missionary helped him win the lawsuit.

But despite this, the miner still suffered a serious loss. In desperation, he proposed to transfer a mine to Liao Linxuan at a price far lower than the market price, thereby raising funds for turnover. Liao Linxuan himself was very moved because he knew very well that the mine might bring huge profits, but this matter was opposed by most people in his family. In their opinion, it is risky to acquire a mine, and they would rather live a stable life by collecting rent.

Old Mrs. Mao knew the value of the mine very well, and she stood up to express her support for her husband's acquisition of the mine. In order to convince others, she promised that if the mine suffered losses, she would be willing to use the Mao family's land to make up for it and not allow the Liao family to bear the losses. Seeing her so grand, the Liao family naturally had nothing to say. In the end, Liao Linxuan bought the mine back with only 12,000 strings of copper coins, which was also the beginning of the rise of the Liao family.

From this time on, the Liao family officially entered the salt industry and established its first business. During the years of the Qing Dynasty, it was not easy for such a business to become bigger and stronger, but fortunately they took advantage of the east wind of Westernization Movement . At that time, the Qing government introduced a series of policies to support private capital to run factories. Taking advantage of this opportunity, the Liao family's industry developed rapidly. After , the 1911 Revolution, , the Republic of China vigorously promoted the development of national industry. Taking advantage of this opportunity, the Liao family successively acquired several mines and a large amount of land.

The Liao family was already the richest man in the local area at that time. After her husband passed away, Old Lady Mao helped her son manage the family business and founded a second business, and the Liao family's business became more and more prosperous. However, the good times did not last long. As the Japanese invaders launched a full-scale war of aggression against China, Yingcheng quickly fell and the mine fell into the hands of the Japanese. At this time, Old Mrs. Mao was calm in the face of danger and asked her grandson Liao Fuchu to return to her hometown and manage the family business with her. The Liao family did not suffer much loss.

It was also from this time that Old Lady Mao fully supported the anti-Japanese war. She not only allowed the chief of the Kuomintang army to live in the old house of the Liao family, but also provided a large amount of supplies. At the same time, she also funded the Communist anti-Japanese army. She once gave tens of thousands of kilograms of salt to the guerrillas and donated a lot of anti-Japanese funds.It was precisely because of Mrs. Mao’s previous actions that Li Shi felt that she was likely to be willing to help the 359th Brigade, so he came to the Liao family as soon as possible.

After meeting Mrs. Mao, Li Shi explained his purpose. He was always worried that Mrs. Mao would not be willing to help after the end of the Anti-Japanese War. But unexpectedly, Old Mrs. Mao did not hesitate at all, and immediately called the housekeeper to open the warehouse and gave a thousand dan of grain to the army. At the same time, she also told Li Shi that the food was given to the army and they did not need to be returned.

Li Shi naturally could not agree with this approach. In the end, under his insistence, Old Lady Mao accepted the IOU. Old Mrs. Mao was quite dissatisfied with this. She said that the Communist Party is for the people and that the Communist army is also fighting for the people. As long as the Communist Party can make the world peaceful, this little food is nothing and the Communist Party does not need to return it. In the end, this batch of food helped Wang Zhen's troops overcome the difficulties. They finally broke through successfully. During the Liberation War, the 359th Brigade was incorporated into the Northwest Field Army and participated in a large number of battles, making important contributions to the victory of the Liberation War.

Letter from old comrades-in-arms

After the end of the Anti-Japanese War, the Liao family returned to their old business and founded a new business to operate a salt mine. However, due to the outbreak of the Liberation War, Liao Fuchu believed that the salt mine business was unstable, so he decided to enter the grocery industry. However, as the civil war progressed, the Kuomintang-ruled areas experienced severe inflation , which caused the Liao family's assets to shrink significantly.

However, the last straw that really crushed the Liao family was the upgrade of salt boiling technology. Because the technology was not updated in time, the Liao family's salt boiling technology quickly fell behind and could not adapt to market demand. In a very short period of time, the Liao family's salt mines were difficult to continue to operate, and eventually they went bankrupt one after another. Liao Fuchu had to return to his hometown to be his own landlord, and the Liao family's experience was also a microcosm of countless national capitals at that time.

After the founding of New China, Liao Fuchu was elected as the local public opinion representative because he helped our army overcome difficulties. But at this moment, the government received a report that Liao Fuchu had suppressed workers before, persecuted Communists, and had head-on conflicts with our party's army.

It turned out that Liao Fuchu had his servants form a mine team before, responsible for maintaining the public order of the mine. However, later the Kuomintang sent people to control the mine, and the mine team was also incorporated. The crimes reported were all done by them under the assignment of the Kuomintang. This made Liao Fuchu feel very innocent because he was just a businessman and he had never done anything that was unfavorable to the Communist Party. But in the end, because many people in the mine team were once servants of the Liao family, Liao Fuchu was convicted and sentenced.

Because Liao Fuchu did not directly command the mine team, he was released without staying in prison for too long. But he has been characterized as a "reactionary", so he was unable to settle down after being released from prison, which has also caused him a lot of inconvenience. This made Liao Fuchu feel very unfair, so he collected information about his grandmother's help in the army everywhere, hoping to justify himself and get rid of his identity as a "reactionary".

But he could not find the IOU. In addition, because many years have passed, he could not find a witness to prove the matter. The complaint went very hard. He tried many times and ended in failure. Gradually, Liao Fuchu also gave up the idea of ​​rectifying his name. At this moment, he accidentally saw an article written by Li Shi in a magazine, which mentioned the story of borrowing grain from the Liao family. Liao Fuchu realized that his opportunity had come.

Unfortunately, Li Shi had already passed away due to illness at that time, and Liao Fuchu's heart sank again. But he was still unwilling to give up. After several twists and turns, he learned that the article published by Li Shi was not written by himself, but was written by Ma Xing. Ma Xing is also an old soldier of the 359th Brigade and is likely to know the situation back then. He then contacted Ma Xing, who attached great importance to this matter after learning about it. At this time, he thought that his old leader Wang Zhen must have known the details of that year and could testify for Liao Fuchu, so he found the letter at the beginning of the article.

Wang Zhen immediately responded after receiving the letter from Ma Xing, saying that he would return it to the Liao family.Wang Zhen came forward to prove that the 359th Brigade had indeed borrowed a thousand dan of food from the Liao family, and this matter was also proved by many old soldiers including Ma Xing. With the testimony of everyone, Liao Fuchu finally successfully rehabilitated the complaint. From then on, he was no longer a reactionary, but a hero who made contributions to the revolution. In addition, the government also gave him some compensation in order to express his apology.

The Communist Party of China can achieve revolutionary victory, which is inseparable from the help of many patriotic people like Mao and Liao Fuchu. And the Party and the country will never forget every person who has contributed to the revolution. No matter how long the matter has passed, the country will find out the truth and will never wrongly accuse any good person. In fact, there are many people like Liao Fuchu who have made contributions to the Party and the country but are unknown. These unsung heroes are even more worthy of our admiration and learning.