Summary of Part 4, Guangzhou, Penghu, and Zhoushan
A pervasive sentimentality captured everyone’s hearts as their time living together in Hunan drew to a close. The students made simple keepsake booklets out of plain paper and wrote messages of encouragement for each other. Journeying out the way they came, the students passed by the homes where they had first stayed when they arrived in Hunan a few months earlier. The man of the house that lodged Songshan— a cloth merchant—signed Songshan’s keepsake booklet and wrote four admonitions:
“To Songshan, as a memento:
• Cultivate calm in moments of anger,
• Be cautious with words spoken in passing,
• Stay mindful of errors made in haste,
• Treasure times of plenty.”
Songshan cherished this piece of paper. He kept it with him for decades—during his solitary and impoverished life wandering around Taiwan.
I. Guangzhou
The teachers and students preparing to retreat traveled by train from the countryside of Hunan Province to Hengyang, an important city in the same province. They stayed there for three days. The teachers took the students to see an American movie, Waterloo Bridge, which left a lasting impression on Songshan. The story, depicting a tragic love torn apart by war, moved the 15-year-old Songshan to tears.
The train then reached Guangzhou, a major city in southern China, north of Hong Kong. They stayed at Haizhu Park, waiting for the ship that would take them to Taiwan. Songshan boarded the “Ji He,” a merchant ship.
Songshan recalled that other ships had sunk during storms along the way. One such tragic event involved the famous “Taiping,” a passenger ship that set sail from Shanghai to Taiwan in the same year (1949). Due to the desperate rush to flee, the ship was overcrowded with passengers, many of whom bribed their way on board with gold bars. It also carried a large cargo, including 600 tons of steel bars, 100 tons of white paper, printing equipment, and over 1,300 boxes of important documents from the Central Bank. Severely overloaded, the ship later collided with a cargo vessel during the voyage, leading to its capsizing and the deaths of 1,000 people, making it one of the deadliest maritime disasters in history.
II. The 7/13 Incident at Penghu
The students and teachers’ ship arrived in Penghu, where they were immediately confronted by small boats with two armed soldiers on each. These soldiers forcibly took away the high school students. Later, Songshan heard that the older students were taken to a military camp, where they were told: “This is your uniform, your military cap, your bowl, and chopsticks,” and were forced to enlist immediately.
At that time, the military units that had retreated from the mainland to Penghu had suffered heavy losses and were short of troops. The commander of the 39th Division of the Penghu Defense Command, Han Fengyi, resented the then Supreme Commander Li Zhenqing and conspired with political warfare officer Chen Fusheng to drive a wedge between the Shandong refugee students and Li Zhenqing, who was also from Shandong. Han Fengyi forcibly recruited Shandong refugee students, enlisting any high school students taller than a rifle, including teachers. The two principals of the Yantai United (Junior and Senior) High Schools, Zhang Minzhi, and Zou Jian, along with other teachers and students, led a movement against the conscription, appealing to politicians and the Ministry of Education in Taipei, asking for permission to continue their studies in Penghu instead of joining the military.
On July 13, 1949, when the military was gathering the students into formation, Principal Zhang Minzhi tried to lead the students away, but Han Fengyi allowed the soldiers to open fire, leading to a bloody conflict. Han Fengyi falsely accused Principal Zhang Minzhi and others of being “communist spies” in a report to Vice President Chen Cheng, who ordered their immediate arrest and elimination. As a result, Han Fengyi arrested, detained, and tortured many teachers and students under the pretext of being communist spies, using methods such as electrocution, force feeding, hanging, and whipping to extract confessions. Many students could not withstand the torture and signed forced confessions, admitting to being communist spies. Songshan heard that resistant students would be tied in sacks filled with stones and thrown into the sea.
By November 1949, over 100 teachers and students had been implicated. After successfully extracting confessions, Han Fengyi accused two principals and five students of espionage and executed them by firing squad. On December 12, 1949, Taipei residents woke up to newspaper headlines reporting the execution, with the headline: “You Can’t Escape! Seven Communist Spies Executed Yesterday,” accompanied by photos. Other students were also imprisoned; some died in jail.
This historical event was not rectified until 1997 and was commemorated with a monument in Penghu in 2008.
During his exile, Songshan had an older friend named Yin Guangju. His family had fled to Taiwan separately, while he himself followed the school into exile, later ending up in Penghu, where he died in prison. Many years later, Songshan met Yin Guangju’s uncle by chance. There, Yin Guangju’s uncle discovered Shongshan had also been a part of Yantai United (Junior and Senior) High School and knew his nephew. Songshan tore out the page of his keepsake booklet where Yin Guangju had written and gave it to him, asking him to pass it on to his father, as it was his son’s last written words.
III. Penghu
Luckily, the younger and shorter students, like Songshan, continued their studies. Songshan attended a school in Magong (the largest island in the Penghu Archipelago), called “Penghu 40th Army Dependents’ School” or “Army Penghu Defense Command Dependents’ School,” later renamed Magong Middle School.
They only had one meal a day. The high school soldiers, who had been forced into the military, would save part of their rations and cook porridge to give to the students, but it was still not enough. The students often had to fight for food, and many girls and younger boys would go without food for two or three days, driven to extreme hunger. The more attractive girls, who were admired or pursued by the soldiers, were fortunate enough to receive extra food. Some would sneak off to other islands to find more food.
At that time, the Marine Corps stationed on another island in Penghu came to Magong to recruit soldiers. Songshan volunteered to join the Navy, and because of his small stature, he became a messenger.
IV. Zhoushan
About five months later, the “First Marine Division,” to which Songshan belonged, was deployed to the Zhoushan Archipelago (off the coast of Zhejiang Province) to garrison. There were still fierce battles between the Nationalist (KMT) and the Communist (CCP) Parties ongoing in the Zhoushan Archipelago—one of the last battlefields of the Chinese Civil War.
During his service in the Zhoushan Archipelago, Songshan contracted malaria. Given the fact access to healthcare and medicine was extremely limited at the time, if one contracted the disease, they would often die due to a lack of medicine and proper care. Yet, miraculously, he recovered on his own after ten days.
Songshan served in the artillery battalion of the First Marine Division and later became a member of the Coast Guard. Their mission was to watch for any approaching Communist ships and fire upon them, but they never came. Songshan recalled that with plenty of idle time, he and his comrades often passed the time by singing traditional opera (Peking Opera).
In May 1950, the Communists finally conquered and occupied the entire Zhoushan Archipelago.
Two large ships, carrying over 10,000 navy soldiers, retreated to the main island of Taiwan. Along the way, the Communists had set up cannons on the surrounding islands they passed, firing at them. However, due to the Communists’ inferior weaponry and the terrain, no cannons were able to hit their targets. The ships safely arrived at Zuoying, Kaohsiung.
