Shenzhangtang Commune recorded the second-highest number of killings in Daoxian, but more significant, it launched the killings in Xianglinpu District. The posting of the commune’s first killings on market day prepared the groundwork for Yuan Lifu’s subsequent “catch-up killing spree.”
The energetic participation of Shenzhangtang Commune’s leaders in the killings is highlighted in the accounts of some women who survived the killing wind. During the Cultural Revolution killings in Daoxian, male victims outnumbered females by a ratio of 3.5:1, but a case could be made that the harm suffered by women and girls was far greater. Survival is a human instinct, but it sometimes comes at great cost in terms of blood and tears, hardship, and degradation. Very few women stepped forward to demand justice on behalf of their relatives during the Task Force’s investigations, and I can understand their heartbreaking silence. Many women from black-element households were forced to marry when their loved ones were killed—some even married the very men who had killed their husbands or parents. After 19 years, they’d raised families in their new households and had made new lives for themselves, and their choice of silence was not so much for themselves as for their children. At the same time, I must express my profound respect for those women who stepped forward to speak on behalf of their unjustly killed loved ones. They chose to register their accusations for the sake of natural justice.
Zhu Guifang was 46 years old and living in Dongzishan, Dongmen Township, when I interviewed her in 1986. This is her recollection:
I was originally from Yapojing Village in the Dongfeng brigade of Shenzhangtang Commune and was married to Zhu Keneng, who at the time of the random killings was a doctor at the Xianglinpu public health clinic. Our brigade started killing people on August 26 [1967]. I’m not clear how the killing began, but it seemed very sudden—the word was given and then people were dragged out and killed. It was said that there were directives from above to once again kill landlords. Because my husband came from a higher-class background, I was scared to death, but when I saw they weren’t going after my family I began to relax a little. I thought that since my husband was a doctor in the district health clinic, he wouldn’t come under the brigade’s jurisdiction, so they wouldn’t kill anyone in our household. What didn’t occur to me was that because my husband worked outside and collected a salary, we had some extra income and perhaps lived better than others, and that drew envy. On August 28, the brigade held a meeting to discuss killing a second batch, and after CRC [Cultural Revolution Committee] chairman Ding Yunhua suggested killing my husband, party secretary Liu Jinchang sent militia commander Tang Mingsheng with some men to Xianglinpu to make the arrest. They arrested my husband at Xianglinpu clinic the next day and killed him on August 31.
I was too terrified to grieve, and I just sat at home trembling from head to foot. My two children, the youngest only three years old, understood enough not to cry or fuss; they just crept quietly to my side and pulled on my arms. Hugging them close, I found they were also trembling. How pitiful they were, at such a young age, to understand that disaster was looming!
Then I remembered that I still had more than 200 kuai in the cupboard, our life savings, which Zhu Keneng and I had hoped would tide us over in the future. When they’d killed class enemies a few days earlier, they’d ransacked their homes from top to bottom, so I took out the money and sewed it into my undergarments. Soon after that, Tang Mingsheng and the others came to my home and yelled, “Zhu Guifang, come out!” I thought they were going to kill me, and my head began buzzing and my legs turned to jelly. I thought it didn’t matter so much if they killed me, but my children were so young, and who would take care of them? Then I heard Tang Mingsheng say, “Go to the clinic and bring back Zhu Keneng’s belongings.” When I realized they hadn’t come to kill me, my heart dropped back from my throat and I hurried to accompany them to the Xianglinpu clinic. At the dormitory where my husband had been staying, I collected his luggage and bedding, his clothes, and his washbasin and thermos bottle, which they had me take to the brigade office to be confiscated as public property. They searched me and took the money I had hidden, and also took all our chickens, ducks, pigs, and grain. After ransacking my home, they forced me to produce my “hidden bankbooks.” I swore to them: “We never deposited any money. If you don’t believe me, go to the credit cooperative, and if they say we deposited any money, you can kill me.” At that, they finally gave up.
After they left, I tidied things up a bit and then put the children to bed. At that time I suddenly felt a stabbing pain in my heart, and tears gushed from my eyes. I couldn’t hold back, no matter how I tried, but I was afraid that my weeping would alarm the neighbors, so I bit down on my lips. All that day I had used all my effort to pacify them and preserve the lives of my family. Now I felt how unjustly we’d been treated. No one in our family had ever done anything wrong. Why should they kill my husband and ransack our home? I lit a lantern and looked at my two sleeping children, and I began to worry about how we would survive now that my husband had been killed and all of our money and belongings had been taken.
The next day, in the afternoon, Tang Mingsheng came back with several militiamen, and without saying a word, he dragged my two children away, and I realized they intended to obliterate my family root and branch. I held onto the three-year-old and begged them to spare one for me, but they tore the child from me and said, “Why spare one who could take revenge in the future?”
So they killed three out of the four of us in the space of two days. I was in utter despair, and no longer caring about anything, I screamed and wept until dark.
Finally, as darkness fell and I’d become hoarse with weeping and had no more tears left, I sat there in my empty house in a daze, feeling no hunger or thirst. That’s when Tang Mingsheng came back. I thought he’d come to kill me, and I just sat there ignoring him, my eyes shut, thinking that if he was going to kill me, he should get it over with, and then our family could be reunited in the underworld and I wouldn’t be left to suffer here alone. I never guessed that the bastard would drag me into the house and take off my clothes. I struggled to push away his hands, imploring him, “Brother Mingsheng, I beg you, don’t do this. … Zhu Keneng has just died, I can’t do this.” That beast Tang Mingsheng held a knife to my throat and said, “You wife of a landlord, you should feel lucky I want you. Mind your manners or you’ll end up like Zhu Keneng.” Then he threw me on the bed and raped me.
After raping me, he looked at me lying on the bed weeping, and with a cheeky grin he said, “What do you have to cry about? I can give you a lot more satisfaction than Zhu Keneng! Be my mistress from now on, and I guarantee that no one will pick on you.” He went on to say a lot of other smutty things that I can’t bear to repeat.
That fellow was worse than a beast. After killing my husband and kids and taking possession of my body, he thought he could keep me under his control. Filled with hatred and fear, I decided I could no longer stay in Yapojing and that I had to find a way to escape.
While I was still working out a plan, on September 9 the brigade killed 16 more people, most of them the children of those killed in the first and second rounds. By that time, the upper level had already sent down a prohibition against further random killings, and the 47th Army had sent people to the village announcing that random killings were not allowed, but the brigade’s accountant, Chen Youzhong, insisted: “We have to eliminate them root and branch. We don’t have the manpower to defeat them, but if we kill them all now, we can rest assured that they won’t avenge themselves on us later.” At that time, it was just too easy to kill. It didn’t take a brigade cadre—even a poor peasant could suggest killing someone, and if you had the wrong class background, you were as good as dead. After they killed you, your family couldn’t say anything and had to behave themselves or they’d all be killed as well.
Yang Geng’e was 37 and a resident of Huangjiatian Village in Jiangyong County’s Xianjie Township when I interviewed her in 1986. This is her story:
I was originally from Zhangjia Village in Daoxian’s Shenzhangtang Commune, but my family is all gone now. My father, Yang Kaixi, was 41 when he died; my mother, Qiu Daixiu, was 38; my eldest brother, Yang Jingfang, was 21; my middle brother, Yang Faxin, was 12; and my youngest brother, Yang Zhengxin, was 9. They all died during Daoxian’s killing wind, killed by a fellow villager named Jiang Dede. The most hateful of Jiang’s accomplices was my sister-in-law, Zhu Jinjiao.
My brother Yang Jingfang married Zhu Jinjiao in 1965, and at first they got along well, but in the winter of the next year, Zhu Jinjiao began an illicit affair with Jiang Dede, and that caused conflict with my brother. At that time, our family had a high class ranking that caused us to be persecuted in the brigade. My dad was very decent, and my eldest brother was somewhat henpecked, so no one said anything. My mother couldn’t hold it back, though, and she always made remarks about Zhu Jinjiao at home but didn’t dare say anything outside. She never imagined that this would give Jiang Dede the idea of killing my brother and taking his wife.
In August 1967, the killing wind blew into our village. On August 25, Jiang Dede led a gang from the brigade in ransacking our house and taking our pigs, chickens, ducks, grain, and everything else of value. By then our brigade had begun killing people, but because my family was particularly well behaved, none of us had been killed. Then on August 27, people came from the district to supervise operations and said we had to “catch up.” Jiang Dede took this opportunity to drag out my mother, Qiu Daixiu, and my brother Yang Jingfang and have them killed. When my family saw this, we were horrified, but my father told us not to make a sound or let our faces reveal our feelings. He said, “They’re dead and there’s nothing we can do. The things that were taken don’t matter, either—what matters is staying alive. Your brother is dead, and Zhu Jinjiao will marry Jiang sooner or later, so let her go.”
We didn’t dare even weep, much less say a word, as Zhu Jinjiao did what she pleased at home and flaunted her strength. Jiang Dede strutted in every evening and slept with Zhu Jinjiao in my brother’s bed. We just pretended not to notice. But then one night, Zhu Jinjiao heard my middle brother cry out for our mother in his sleep. She told Jiang Dede, “When he’s older, he’ll take revenge. It’s better to destroy them root and branch.”
On August 30, Jiang Dede led a group of men who arrested my brothers Yang Faxin and Yang Zhengxin and killed them.
On September 3, Jiang Dede and Zhu Jinjiao had their wedding ceremony.
My father quickly sent me off to a relative’s home to hide, and that saved my life. By then the upper levels had already sent down a directive forbidding random killings, but on that day, September 10, Jiang Dede used a hoe to beat my father Yang Kaixi to death. Everyone in my family was killed except me. Now he claims he was acting under orders, but I say he was killing people in order to take a man’s wife, eliminate further trouble, and seize our goods! I insist that the government make Jiang Dede pay with his life. That’s not too much to ask—his one life in return for five of ours.
At that, she broke down weeping.
The most important but also the hardest thing I did in Daoxian was interview survivors. Every interview was full of blood and tears. It was suffocating, like having the eyes of the victims drilling into the depths of one’s soul. Although the pain belonged to others, its enormous weight and profound reality brought a sense of the common grief of mankind. We had an opportunity to interview a survivor whose husband was among the first batch killed in Xianglinpu Commune’s Diaogaolou brigade.
Yan Shihai, a secondary-school librarian originally from Guang’an, Sichuan Province, was 54 when I interviewed her in 1986, but she looked much older, her hair gray and her spirit shattered. In a heavy Sichuan accent she said, “Lao Yang has been dead all these years, but I still live that nightmare. I don’t dare go out among crowds; the slightest movement sends my heart to my throat. I wake up terrified in the middle of the night and lie there weeping alone in my bed. Imagine what it was like, being locked in a cage and watching the people around you being taken out, one group at a time, to be slaughtered. The first group, then the second group—everyone killed. I was in the third group, and if they’d been quicker about it, my head would have rolled as well, and I’d be with Lao Yang. …” At this point she broke down and wept. We could only keep comforting her, hoping she could emerge from this shadow in the precious years remaining to her.
My husband’s name was Yang Tianxun. He graduated from Chongqing’s Central University1 in the 1940s, but rather than engage in politics or follow the Kuomintang to Taiwan,2 he returned to his native place, Daoxian, and served as head teacher in the county high school. Lao Yang was a versatile man and an excellent artist. In the early years of the Cultural Revolution, Chairman Mao’s quotes and portrait were everywhere, and since Lao Yang was an artist, others asked him to produce a Mao portrait. At that time, Chairman Mao was called the Red Sun and was portrayed with light beaming from his head. Lao Yang did his best to reproduce these rays of light, but for some reason, some of the revolutionary masses didn’t like the effect and said, “Those aren’t rays of light, they’re arrows; they’re the poisoned arrows of the counterrevolutionaries aimed at our Great Leader Chairman Mao!” What a disaster! He was pulled out and struggled. With his political background, what could he say? Lao Yang gave a rational self-defense and raised plenty of comparable examples, so he was ultimately cleared of a “venomous attack”3 but was labeled an “active counterrevolutionary,” dismissed from his job, and sent back to his native village for labor reform. That was considered lenient. If he’d been convicted of a venomous attack, he would have been sentenced to at least 10 years of labor reform. The children and I were fortunate enough to be allowed to remain in town. Looking back now, he would have been better off imprisoned than being sent back to the countryside and killed.
Lao Yang’s native place was Xianglinpu Commune’s Datoushan production brigade. I’d been there before. It was an ancient town on a main thoroughfare from Hunan to Guangdong and Guangxi. I was very worried about Lao Yang being sent back to the village, because his health was not robust, and I didn’t know how well he could bear up under labor reform. During the summer school break in 1967, I took the children to visit him, and he was overjoyed. After several months’ absence, his gray hair, jutting cheekbones, sunken eyes, and straggly whiskers made him look at least 10 years older. He was still in good spirits, though, and said he needed to correct his thinking and remold himself, starting with labor. He told me he’d learned a lot about farming, and that we needn’t worry, because he could look after himself. Even living alone, Lao Yang kept his home clean and tidy, especially his “loyalty altar,” which in accordance with the county’s requirements had a treasured image of Chairman Mao over a red paper cutout of the word zhong, for loyalty, and “Long live Chairman Mao!” and “Long live the Communist Party!” on either side. Under the zhong character, a small wooden shelf held four volumes of Mao Zedong’s Selected Works and Quotations of Chairman Mao in a red plastic cover. Lao Yang had everything beautifully arranged, and this put me at ease. Since I wasn’t from the countryside, I wasn’t expected to work in the fields, and I planned to spend the summer break restoring his health.
I remember at noon on August 26, he came back from the fields after a “double rush” planting and harvesting, and after eating two big bowls of congee, he lay down for a quick nap. Just as he fell asleep, an urgent whistling sounded through the village. Coming from the county town, I was more up to date on current events, and I told him, “Lao Yang, I’ve heard there have been random killings in the villages; you have to be careful.” Exhausted after his morning’s labor, he lay on the bed and said languidly, “Don’t be silly, I read the brigade’s newspaper every day. The Cultural Revolution isn’t targeting people like us. As long as we work hard and don’t talk out of turn or do something foolish, nothing will happen.” He’d barely finished saying this when militiamen armed with knives burst in our door and took him away. Our children and I were petrified, wondering what he could have done. The children began crying, but I urged them to be still. Before we could recover from our panic, another group burst in and wordlessly dragged us out as well.
I was taken to a primary school not far from Xianglinpu Commune, where I was held with Lao Yang and many others in a classroom used as a makeshift prison. It was hot and crowded, and the stench of sweat and urine was overwhelming. Many people had been grabbed right out of the fields and were still covered with mud. Around four o’clock in the afternoon, people outside carrying knives and guns began calling out names, while the rest of us were ordered to kneel with heads lowered in the classroom. The first person called out was my husband, and as soon as he walked out the door, militiamen grabbed him and bound him fast. It seems he felt compelled to say something, and the leader, a man surnamed Yang, raised a brick and slammed it into his head. Lao Yang’s skull was fractured, and he cried out in agony. That horrible sound still rings in my ears. I raised my head to look, but a man standing in the doorway with a knife yelled, “Head down!” Terrified, I lowered my head at once, and fearing I would cry out, I bit my lip until it bled.
Lao Yang was in the first batch to be killed. A dozen or so were pulled out, and seeing what had happened to Lao Yang, the others didn’t dare utter a word but were dragged over to Niaozai Pond, not far from the school, and were hacked to death with sabers. Two days later, another 30-odd4 people were called out and hacked to death beside the pond. All that remained were a few women who were to be killed in the third round.
I don’t know how I passed those few days. After Lao Yang’s death, I was so petrified that I couldn’t shut my eyes, day or night, and any sound sent my heart to my throat. Desperately I told them that I was just Yang Tianxun’s family member, that I was from the city and not from this county, and that I had a clean record and a good family background. I begged them to make their own inquires and free me. But who would listen? How I regretted ever coming to this nest of murderers! But what could I do now? Saying too much only increased their rage, so it was best to await death in silence.
When they killed the second batch, it was at noon under a blazing sun, but as they pulled those 30 people out, the sky suddenly darkened; thunder roared and rain came down in torrents for more than two hours. In the classroom, we women murmured to each other, “Listen, even heaven is weeping!”
I was never one to believe in fate, but from then on I became superstitious. I believed that fate decides life and death, honor, and riches, and that there was no escaping our fate.
The rain delayed burial of those 30-odd people, so the next day we women were ordered to go out and bury the corpses. I’d always been scared to look at the dead, but in order to save myself and my children, I immediately did what they told me. My God! My legs turned to jelly at the sight of that stack of corpses next to Niaozai Pond. I still remember clearly that the eyes of the dead were shut tight. It’s said that when the innocent are killed, their eyes remain open in accusation, but I think that these people couldn’t bear the sight of their own slaughter. The militiamen gave us wooden hooks and ordered us to drag the corpses into a pit next to the pond, and then we covered them with a thin layer of yellow soil.
There was a middle-aged woman among us whose husband had been killed in this group, and when she saw her husband’s corpse, she fainted dead away. It’s said that she subsequently went mad, constantly calling her husband’s name.
Two more days passed, and just when the time came to kill the rest of us, Unit 6950 of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) arrived in the villages and stopped the killing. People in yellow uniforms drove away the people who were guarding us, and we were saved. In that week I aged 20 years, and by the time they released me I was unrecognizable. After my release I stopped menstruating, and although it eventually resumed after a great deal of time and medication, my general health was irretrievably broken.
From what we could determine, there was never any intention to kill Yuan Shihai and the other women; like the women in the above two narratives, they were to be distributed as the spoils of victory.