The two pictures attached are old photos of a Christian church located in Shima Liberation West Road, Longhai City, Zhangzhou, Fujian. In 1859, a Christian meeting place was set up in Xizibian, Daxiangqian, Shima, in an “old fashioned house, Junai Hall, bought from a man with the last name of Wang”.
In 1927, the church staff of Shima Church found that “the six-brick column in the center of Junai Hall obstructed the line of sight, and in 12th year the color of the centre sill seemed to change suddenly. They believed that the column was damaged by worms and about to collapse”. Under the proposal of Pastor Ang Khek Chhiong, the Shima Church decided to “tear down the old walls and rebuild a new foundation”. In twelve years (from 1915 to 1927), the church collected 17,257 yuan from believers at home and abroad, then a new spectacular Shima Christian church was built in the following year at the cost of 17,400 yuan. The new church had an elegant environment. The middle of it was a lobby of typical Chinese architectural style. There were also two buildings around the church: the clergy house and the deacon Building. The whole architecture was surrounded by walls. Inside the walls are all kinds of flowers and trees introduced from home and abroad. A flagpole was erected, setting off this magnificent Chinese palatial architecture.
This palatial church, rarely seen in China, was the former headquarters of the Fourth Army of the Chinese Central Red Army 88 years ago. In April 1932, Chairman Mao Zedong led the Central Red Army to conquer Zhangzhou. The Third Army of the Red Army entered Zhangzhou through the north gate and joined the Fourth Army of the Red Army, which entered the city from the west gate. After the victory of Zhangzhou on the 20th, according to the deployment of the headquarters of the East Route Army, the Fourth Army of the Red Army, under the leadership of the commander Wang Liang and the chief of staff He Ting, was stationed at Shima on the afternoon of April 21st. The military headquarters was set up in this Chinese-style church. The Red Army stationed in Shima strictly implemented the urban policy, carefully differentiated among the people, and made every effort not to commit the slightest offense against the civilians. They went into the countryside to fight the local tyrants and evil gentry, burned the land deeds, distributed the land and grain, and helped the poor people. During this period, the Shima Revolutionary Committee of Workers and Peasants was established. The Committee cooperated with the Red Army in accomplishing three tasks, namely, encouraging the masses to participate in the revolutionary struggle, writing revolutionary slogans, and setting up podiums to preach revolutionary principles. Three large-scale mass meetings were held in Shima to propagate to the masses the revolutionary proposition of overthrowing the Kuomintang reactionaries, establishing areas as Soviets, and making the poor the masters of the country, as well as the anti-Japanese proposition of the Party and the Red Army.
In Shima, the Fourth Army of the Red Army also added four to five hundred Red Army soldiers, many of whom were young intellectuals, thus consolidating and expanding the Western Fujian Soviet Area. They developed the guerrilla warfare in the Southern Fujian Area, and effectively promoted the development of the Longhai Soviet Area.
Interestingly, the above photos of several Red Army soldiers, including the army commander and chief of staff of the Fourth Army of the Red Army, were shot by a Christian church elder, Zhu Zhifu, whose father was Zhu Jichang, the owner of Zhu Jichang Photo Studio (After liberation, it was renamed Shima Liberation East Photo Studio). The photos were provided by the grandson of Zhu Zhifu, Mr. Zhu, who is presently the vice-chairman of Zhangzhou CC&TSPM and the director of Shima Jiexi Church.
(The original article is published by Gospel Times.)
- Translated by Nicolas Cao
