nd peaceable, but disaster befell them just the same.
Around 1900, when Sichuan Province was hit by successive years of drought, numerous
poverty-stricken peasants went hungry and had to go out in crowds to seize food from the
homes of landlords. Thereupon I saw with my own eyes how a group of shabbily-dressed
peasants and their families were savagely beaten up or slain by government troops, the
road stained with their blood for some 40 li and their cries rending the air. In those days,
my family also met with increasing difficulties. All the year round, we went without rice to
eat, and simply lived on edible wild hers and kaoliang. In 1904, especially, when land-
lords, riding roughshod over tenants, pressed for higher rents on the let-out pieces of land,
we, unable to meet their demands, had our tenancy cancelled by them and were forced to
move house on New Year’s Eve. On that miserable night, my family tearfully separated
and thenceforth had to live in two different places. Shorthandedness and crop failure due to
the natural calamity brought misfortune on my family. Mother, however, did not lose heart.
Adversity had deepened her sympathy for the poor and needy as well as her aversion to the
heartless rich. The painful complaint she had uttered in one or two words and the
innumerable injustice I had witnessed aroused in me a spirit of revolt and a desire for a
bright future. I made up my mind to seek a new life.
Not long afterwards, I had to tear myself away from mother when I began my
schooling. As the son of a tenant, I of course could not afford to go to school. My parents,
however, faced with the bullying and oppression of the local evil gentry, landlords and
yamen bailiffs, decided to scrape up enough money by living a very frugal life to pay for
my education so that they could make a scholar of me for the family to keep up
appearances. At first I was sent to an old-style private school and in 1905 I took the
imperial examination. Later, I went farther away from home to study in Shunqing and
Chengdu, both in Sichuan Province. All the tuition fees were paid with borrowed money,
totaling more than 200 silver dollars. The debt was not repaid until later I became a brigade
commander of the Hu Guo Army.
In 1908, I came back from Chengdu to set up a higher primary school in Yi Long
County. While teaching school, I went home to see mother two or three times a year, in
those days, there was a sharp conflict between old and new ideologies. Due to our leaning
towards science and democracy, we met with opposition from the local conservative
influential gentry in whatever we attempted for the benefit of our home town. So I decided
to leave, without my mother’s knowledge, for the faraway province of Yunnan, where I
joined the New Army and Tongmenhui. On my arrival in Yunnan, I learned from my home
letters that mother, instead of frowning upon my new move, gave me a lot of ∫∫
encouragement and comfort.
From 1909 up to now, I have never paid a visit to my home town. In 1921, however, I
had my parents come out to live with me. But, as confirmed farm labourers, they felt
unwell without land to till and subsequently had to return home. Father died on the way
back, and mother continued to do farm work at home to the very last.
As the Chinese revolution continued to develop, I became more and more politically
aware. I joined the Chinese Communist party as soon as I discovered the correct
orientation of the Chinese revolution. When the Great Revolution of 1924-1927 failed in
China, I completely lost contact with my family. Mother alone supported the whole family
by working on the 30 mu of land. I did not hear from her until the outbreak of the War of
Resistance to Japan. When she was informed of great cause in which I was engaged, she
eagerly looked forward to the success of China’s national liberation. While living the hard
life of a peasant woman at