Courtyard Houses: Longevity Since the War of Resistance

To all compatriots across the country: Since the July 7th Incident, the iron hooves of the Japanese invaders have trampled our land, causing widespread war and immense suffering. All Chinese sons and daughters, regardless of north or south, young or old, have united in their hatred of the enemy and fought a bloody resistance for over five years.

Today, after more than a month of bloody fighting, our 18th Group Army completely liberated the entire territory of Shanxi Province yesterday at noon! The ancient city of Taiyuan has returned to China! The First Army of the Japanese North China Area Army suffered a devastating defeat at the hands of our army; its commander, Yoshio Shinotsuka, was killed in the Taiyuan Governor's Mansion! In this battle, our anti-Japanese soldiers, with their flesh and blood, resisted the enemy's steel; with their unwavering will to die, they reclaimed their homeland. From southeastern Shanxi to northwestern Shanxi, the thousand-mile front was engulfed in flames of war. Our soldiers fought bravely, one after another, with the support of the people, until finally the North China security zone was utterly crushed!

The liberation of Shanxi was not merely the gain or loss of a single city or territory. This marked the first time since the start of the Chinese nation's War of Resistance against Japan that an entire province had been recovered! This battle proved that although the Japanese invaders were fierce, they could not last long, and although China was weak, its will could not be broken!

At this moment, the people of Shanxi Province are assisting our army in clearing the battlefield, burying the remains of fallen heroes, and rebuilding their homes. Smoke rises again from the ruins, and the sound of reading returns to the school.

With this telegram, I extend my comfort to all my compatriots across the nation: victory is in sight! Brightness lies ahead! I urge the military and civilians of the entire nation to redouble their efforts, bravely fight the enemy, and completely drive the Japanese invaders out of our Chinese land!

Final victory will surely belong to me!

Zhu, Commander-in-Chief of the 18th Group Army

Deputy Commander-in-Chief Peng

Spring of the 31st year of the Republic of China

This telegram, sent in plain text, was relayed throughout the country.

Yancheng

A young cipher clerk rushed out of the telegraph room, his face flushed, and shouted at the top of his lungs to the comrades shoveling snow in the courtyard: "The entire territory of Shanxi has been liberated!"

The shouts echoed through the winter courtyard.

The broom stopped, the conversation ceased, and everyone paused for a moment. The next second, cheers nearly lifted the roof off the cave dwelling, and the women hugged each other, jumping, laughing, and crying.

The staff officers from the operations section punched each other hard on the shoulders, while the young soldiers on guard duty hugged their guns to their chests, grinned foolishly, and showed off their white teeth.

The instructor stood at the entrance of the cave dwelling, watching the bustling scene in the courtyard. He had a smile on his face, but his eyes were also a little red.

He said to the guards around him, "Pass the word down: tonight, all troops, schools, and civilians in Yan'an City should go to the square. We're going to hold a victory rally! Tell the logistics comrades to find a way to ensure that everyone gets at least a bowl of hot meat soup and a steamed bun tonight!"

The order spread like wildfire.

As evening fell, people from all the valleys and ravines of Yancheng, carrying torches and lanterns, flocked to the square from all directions. The torches formed a river, and the lanterns merged into a sea.

The folk songs are sung, and the Yangko dance begins.

An old man selling roasted sweet potatoes pushed his oven to the roadside and started handing them out to everyone he met: "Eat! It's free! We brought them back from our hometown!"

A young cadre from Shanxi, who had just graduated from the Anti-Japanese Military and Political University and been assigned to the headquarters, squatted down at the edge of the boiling crowd, buried his face in his hands, and his shoulders trembled violently.

His hometown was a county town on the outskirts of Taishi, which had been occupied by the Japanese for five years. This morning, he was looking at that familiar place name on the map with a heavy heart, but now it was free.

A small town in the southwest, beside the Burma Road.

Just as dawn was breaking, the town hall door was pounded on. The clerk on night duty rubbed his eyes and opened the door, only to find Old Zhang, the postman, standing there panting, clutching a telegram he had just copied from the county, his face flushed with excitement.

"Quick! Post it out! Hurry! Hurry! Breaking news! It's from Yancheng! It's in plain sight!"

The clerk took it and his hands began to tremble. The two men, without exchanging a word, one made paste, the other searched for a wooden board. A moment later, a brand-new, large red paper, its ink still dripping, was pasted onto the wooden board at the town entrance, where notices were always posted.

"Good news! Telegram sent nationwide! The entire territory of Shanxi Province has been liberated! Our army has won a great victory!"

The villagers who had come to the early market slowly gathered around, and a private tutor in a long gown was pushed forward by the crowd to read. The old man adjusted his glasses, cleared his throat, and had just read the six characters "the entire territory of Shanxi Province has been restored" when his voice choked up. He paused for a long time before continuing to read with trembling voice.

Old Chen, the teahouse owner, was poking at the stove when he heard the growing commotion outside and poked his head out to look.

He was an old man who had fled from Shanxi five years ago. Upon hearing the news, the fire tongs in his hand clattered to the ground. Trembling, he walked behind the counter and pulled a small cloth bag from the bottom drawer. Inside was a handful of yellow soil he had grabbed from under the old locust tree at the village entrance when he left home.

five years.

The cloth bag was never opened.

Reaching the shop entrance, facing north, he knelt down with a thud and gently sprinkled a small clump of hardened yellow earth in front of the threshold.

"My wife, my child, we can go home now," tears streamed down her aged face.

Chongshi, Guofu Road.

An urgent copy of the telegram was placed on Old Man You's desk. The head of the aide-de-camp reported in a low voice, "This is Yan'an's plain text; it can be received nationwide. This is a copy."

The Chairman stared at the telegram for a long time, then took off his glasses and slowly wiped it with a velvet cloth.

"Send a telegram," he said calmly, "in the name of the Military Commission, to commend the Eighteenth Group Army and its units in the Second War Zone. The wording must be formal and affirm the results. Also, notify the Central News Agency to publish the news on the front page with a striking headline."

"Title should use..."

"Use the report of our army's victory in North China: the entire Shanxi province has been liberated." The Chairman paused, then added, "The 18th Group Army should state the facts in the telegram."

"Yes."

The next day, it was featured on the front page of the Central Daily News, with the headline running across the entire page.

The newsboys in the mountain town shouted with extra fervor: "Read the newspaper! Read the newspaper! The entire territory of Shanxi has been liberated! The enemy general is dead!"

The newspapers were quickly snapped up. On the streets, people gathered to listen to literate people read the newspapers aloud. In teahouses, people whispered amongst themselves, their voices barely audible: "It's them again!"

At Chaotianmen Wharf, while the dockworkers were unloading cargo, they took a break, pooled their money to buy half a jin of the cheapest liquor, and ate it with fried beans they had brought from home, passing around a broken bowl.

"Who cares who hit him?" The oldest worker took a sip of his liquor, his eyes squinting from the spiciness, and said in a hoarse voice, "He hit some bastard! He won! That's enough! Come on, let's have another one!"

The occupied area, Beijing.

In the dead of night, in the east wing of an inconspicuous courtyard deep in the coal ash alley, the curtains were drawn tightly shut. Several young people huddled around a radio, secretly assembled from scrap parts, its casing worn and tattered. The volume knob was turned to almost its lowest setting, and one had to press their ear close to the screen to barely catch the faint, intermittent signal.

Amidst the electrical noise, an excited yet restrained voice faintly drifted through: "...The entire territory has been liberated...Yoshio Shinotsuka is dead..."

The room was deathly silent for a few seconds.

Several people looked up abruptly and saw the same light in each other's eyes.

The girl, who looked like a student and wore round glasses, covered her mouth tightly, her shoulders trembling violently, tears streaming down her face, but she dared not utter a single sob.

They were members of an underground organization that had infiltrated Beijing. This group was responsible for intelligence transmission and the secret printing of propaganda materials.

The team leader, a calm-looking man in his thirties, took a deep breath and said in an almost inaudible whisper, "Copy it down, word for word. Lao Wu, you're in charge of engraving the printing plates. Xiao Mei, prepare the paper and ink. The first batch of leaflets must be printed before dawn."

The sound of the Japanese military police patrol's heavy, rhythmic boots came from outside the window, approaching and then fading away. The people inside held their breath until the footsteps completely disappeared.

The next morning, leaflets, still damp with ink, quietly appeared in many corners of Beijing. On a wall near Jingshan Park, next to a notice from the Japanese about increased security, a small piece of paper was pasted...

"Good news flies: Shanxi's lands have been restored to glory, and the enemy leader has been beheaded. Dawn is breaking in North China; our compatriots must persevere!"

At Qianmen Railway Station, an old man selling cigarettes would secretly slip a small note under the cigarette pack when handing one to a regular customer.

The notice board of the fake municipal government was covered with a sign pasted on it with glue, which infuriated the police chief, who ordered it to be torn down and searched throughout the city.

In the teahouse, the storyteller had changed his script today, and the gavel snapped open.

"Last time we talked about how Yue Fei defeated the Jin army at Zhuxian Town. Today we'll continue by telling how Yue Fei's army swept through the enemy lines and marched straight to the Jin capital..." The listeners held their covered bowls, blowing away the foam. The lids and rims of the bowls made a crisp, rhythmic sound.

In the corner, a middle-aged man in a gray cloth robe slowly finished the remaining tea in his cup, placed a few coins on the table, and got up to leave. As he passed the next table, he uttered two words in a very low voice: "Soon."

Jiangnan, the base area.

General Mi Gu was studying the enemy situation with several commanders in front of a map when the communications officer practically burst into the makeshift command post, waving a newspaper in his hand. His voice trembled with excitement: "Commander! Telegram! A telegram from Yan'an in clear code! The entire Shanxi region has been liberated!"

The command post fell silent instantly, all eyes turning to him. General Mi Gu took the telegram, quickly scanned it, and then handed it to his chief of staff. "Immediately transmit this telegram to all detachments, county brigades, and district squads! Every soldier and every villager in the base area must know this good news!"

He walked to the map and pointed to the densely populated strongholds of the Japanese army in southern Jiangsu and eastern Zhejiang: "Notify all units to seize any opportunity when the enemy might waver, and starting tomorrow night, intensify the harassment offensive! Remove enemy strongholds, disrupt transportation, and make as much noise as possible! We must let the Japanese in East China know that their backyard is not safe either!"

The news spread like wildfire, reaching every corner of the water towns and reed marshes.

A company training by the lake erupted in thunderous cheers upon hearing the political instructor's announcement. Old Wang, the head cook, had joined the revolution five years earlier from the Taihang Mountains in Shanxi. Upon hearing that his hometown had been liberated, he was stunned for a long time. Without saying a word, he returned to the cookhouse and brought out the last bit of cured meat and dried mushrooms he had hidden to nourish the seriously wounded soldiers for the New Year. They were served as an extra meal that evening.

He squatted in front of the stove, adding fuel to the fire, repeatedly muttering, "Good, good, that's good now."

A young soldier from southern Jiangsu, who had only been in the army for six months, excitedly approached his squad leader: "Squad leader, they've taken over all of Shanxi, so far away. Are these traitorous pillboxes right outside our door going to be destroyed soon too?"

The squad leader gazed at the northern sky, patted the young soldier's still thin shoulder firmly, and said with a determined look, "That's right! This battle in Shanxi has dealt a heavy blow to the Japanese's confidence. The whole country is interconnected; if we win here, the Japanese elsewhere will panic. Let's keep up the good work, and sooner or later we'll recover all of southern Jiangsu! Just wait and see!"

Shanghai, the F Concession, the top floor of an apartment building facing the street.

The female intelligence agent codenamed Nightingale had just turned off her shortwave transmitter when the plaintext telegram coming through her earpiece struck her heart like a heavy hammer.

She sat quietly for a moment, then pushed open a small ventilation window.

The damp, chilly air of late autumn dawn rushed in, carrying the distinctive fishy smell of the Huangpu River and the clanging of night trams. Beyond the concessions lay the boundless darkness and silence of the occupied territory.

Returning to the table, he turned on a desk lamp, spread out a sheet of specially made heat-developing writing paper, took out an ultra-fine needle-tip pen embedded in a fountain pen, and began to write.

"The old shopkeeper went to the concession to discuss business and then went missing. We urgently need to find out where he is, as delays may lead to complications. We hope that someone from his hometown can help us. Nightingale."