They Fight for Justice

In 1936, when Japan was escalating its war of aggression against China, Francisco Franco’s rebel army staged a military coup against the Spanish Republican government that was supported by socialists of various persuasions, such as farmers, workers and even students. The Fascist dictators, Adolf Hitler in Germany and Benito Mussolini in Italy, assisted Franco to subvert the Republic’s political order as part of a bigger conspiracy of outright invasion. They deployed new lethal weapons to kill Spanish people as a prelude to their WWII assault on world peace. As a result the call to “defend Madrid” spread throughout the world―including every corner of China.

Unknown to many people today, some Chinese took part in the struggle. They were internationalists, just like the Canadian surgeon Norman Bethune, whose dedication to China’s liberation cause after work in Spain eventually led to his death in 1939.

This important historical fact is liable to be forgotten, so it is important to record it now. Ni Hwei-ru and Len Y. Tson, two Chinese Americans wrote a book The Call of Spain: Chinese Volunteers in the Spanish Civil War. In addition, The Brave Chinese Volunteers Shed Blood in Spain, edited and printed by the National Museum of China, has collected historical materials about the Chinese volunteers in the International Brigades, enshrining their memory forever.

When Japan invaded China, people of various countries in the world also lent a helping hand. The UK, Norway and India sent medical teams to China to provide support for the Chinese people in their fight against Japanese aggressors. Some doctors came to China via Spain after passing through many places. Norman Bethune returned to Canada after serving on the Spanish battlefield and then came to China. Because of the article In Memory of Norman Bethune written by Chairman Mao, many people came to know more about this brave friend of China. Among those who came to China via Spain were German, Austrian, Czech, Bulgarian, Romanian, Polish, Hungarian, Russian and Indian doctors. They were all known as “Spanish doctors” in China.

A disaster in any place on the earth is a common disaster of humankind, so that mutual assistance is an essential part of human nature. During the Spanish Civil War, from 1936 to 1938, a total of more than 40,000 international volunteers from 53 countries went to Spain to form the International Brigades. They fought shoulder to shoulder with the local people against the fascists in defense of the Spanish homeland. They included over a hundred Chinese volunteers. According to investigation, most of them went to Spain from other parts of Europe and the United States; some also traveled from China, however. With a warm heart and high internationalist spirit they fought bravely. Most of them laid down their lives in Spain, leaving no names, no records at all. But, the Chinese and Spanish people will never forget them.

A Chinese language newspaper published in New York at that time carried a poem in praise of the Chinese fighters:

The war in the East and the one in the West,

Though tens of thousands of miles apart,

Both decide the rise and fall of cultures;

Our struggle is to resist aggression,

What we want is to uphold democracy.

…

Till all fascists are wiped out

And democracy prevails,

Four hundred million compatriots will greet your homecoming with open arms.

Oh, why return home?

Look, with the blue sky as the ceiling, the earth as the ground,

And twenty-eight constellations as walls:

Human beings are all brothers and sisters,

And the whole world is our native land.

The willingness to make sacrifice is summed up by the words of an ancient Chinese hero: “Green hills everywhere are good for burying loyal bones, why send home our remains wrapped in horse hide?”

China and Spain are widely separated, but they shared a common threat. China was invaded by Japanese imperialists while Spain suffered persecution by fascists. Thus there was a great need for mutual support. At that time in China the song Defend Madrid composed by Lu Ji was very popular. Its words are as follows:

Take up our explosive hand grenades,

Target them at murderous Franco.

Arise! Arise!

All Spanish people, for freedom and independence of your motherland,

Immediately join the front fighting for peace.

Arise! Arise!

Let’s wage a life and death struggle against traitorous lackeys.

Defend Madrid!

Defend world peace.

In his letter dated May 15, 1937 to the Spanish people and comrades fighting in the armed struggle, Mao Zedong wrote: “Many comrades of the Chinese Red Army also wish to go to Spain to join you… Were it not that we are face to face with the Japanese enemy, we would join you and take our place in your front ranks.”

During her visit to Yan’an in the summer of 1937, American journalist Helen Foster Snow (also known as Nym Wales, and wife of the legendary Edgar Snow at that time) took part in a demonstration organized by the local people in support of the Spanish against fascism. She held high a poster with the words “No Pasaran!” (They Shall Not Pass), as she walked at the front of the procession.

During his exile abroad in the name of a study tour after the Xi’an Incident, General Yang Hucheng led a delegation to Spain and met with General Jose Miaja, head of the Spanish Popular Front, and presented him with a silk banner on which were written “Fight together for independence, democracy and peace!”

After attending the third International Conference of the World Students Federation in the French city of Nice in 1938, Gong Pusheng (later, China’s first ambassador to Ireland, in 1979) went to the Camp Gurs, located in Pau, in southwestern France at the foot of the Pyrenees, to see Chinese fighters, among whom was Xie Weijin. Seeing one of his compatriots while living in such straitened circumstances greatly excited Xie. He handed Gong a pile of photographs he had taken on the battlefields and asked her to bring them home.

In 1938, after experiencing many setbacks, a sailor brought a big red silk banner with the signatures of Zhu De, Zhou Enlai and Peng Dehuai to Spain and gave it to “tens of valiant fighters who are taking part in the war”. On the banner the words “To the Chinese Detachment of International Brigades, Unite the peoples of Spain and China! Down with the common foe of mankind―Fascists!” were written both in Chinese and English. This banner is now housed in the National Museum of China.

The war situation in Spain was not optimistic. After the Battle of Gandesa in April 1938,the Franco army cut the Republic of Spain in half, making it impossible for the anti-fascist forces in the country’s north and south to combine their efforts. The Republican Army suffered repeated defeat and the International Brigades heavy casualties. Seeing the situation was beyond saving, the Spanish Prime Minister decided to unilaterally withdraw all the international volunteers, expecting that Western countries would exert pressure on Germany to withdraw its troops from Spain. At the end of 1938, the International Brigades left Spain and Franco won the war without having to fight any more. The UK and France successively recognized the Franco regime. Not long afterwards, such appeasement of Fascism led to Hitler invading Poland and the Second World War began.

The fate of the international volunteers took a sudden turn for the worse. They retreated to France and were put in concentration camps by France.

According to the investigation made by Ni Hwei-ru and Len Y. Tson, instead of forming a Chinese detachment, the more than 100 Chinese that took part in the Spanish Civil War were assigned to different brigades. That’s why records about these Chinese volunteers were fragmented, adding difficulties to the investigation. However, the two authors finally found records of a dozen of the Chinese volunteers. But the whereabouts of others remained unknown and, in fact, some were already dead. From their relatives, friends and documents they learnt something about these Chinese volunteers:

Xie Weijin, (alias Ling Ching Siu) was born in Bishan County, Sichuan Province in 1899. He went to Shanghai to study and, in 1919, participated in the pro-democracy May 4th Movement there. Later he went to France for part-work and part-study. In 1926 he joined the Communist Youth League in Europe, and in the following year joined the CPC European Branch, doing publicity work. He worked as correspondent for the International Newsletter, Chinese Workers and Peasants Newsletter, and News of China published by the Communist International. In April 1937, leaving his 12-year-old son in Switzerland, he went to Spain. In his letter to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Spain, he said, “I came to Spain not for a short stay but to go to the battlefront. I will exert my utmost to fight as a soldier. I hope the Committee will grant me this right and let me join the International Brigades just like many other foreign comrades.” He was assigned to the machine gun company of the Austrian Battalion, but was wounded by a bullet that ripped through his right leg below the knee. He was sent to hospital for an operation. When his condition improved, he asked to be allowed to resume work. In 1925, in Germany he was the leader of the CPC German Branch and got acquainted with Zhou Enlai who gave him a camera. With this camera, he went to various hospitals of the International Brigades, where he could pass freely, to take pictures for transmission to the Chinese People’s Front published in Paris. Because of his wound, he could no longer engage in combat; so, he had time to write articles. He provided the Spanish progressive newspapers with information about China’s War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the Communist Party of China, and sent photos and information about the Chinese volunteers to newspapers in Spain, France, and the United States as well as in China. He once, on behalf of the Chinese volunteers, wrote a letter to Chiang Kai-shek, then chairman of the National Military Council of the Nationalist Government of China, saying “The Chinese volunteers have fought to defend freedom and independence of Spain in one place after another for several years, which has also dealt a blow to those seeking to prevent liberation of our Chinese nation. When opportunity comes, my comrades in arms and I will return to the motherland immediately to fight on the battlefield.” In early 1939 Xie Weijin was sent with the other surviving international volunteers to concentration camps in France. They were ill treated and suffered many hardships, being interrogated individually and then disbanded. After having stayed in the concentration camp for eight months, he and another six Chinese volunteers at last were permitted to return home. When passing through Switzerland, together with his Russian newly-wedded wife, Anna Kapeller and his son, who was already 15 years old, returned to China by ship. They arrived in Chongqing via Singapore, Hong Kong and Vietnam. In Chongqing, he got in touch secretly with Zhou Enlai and Wang Bingnan. In 1946, Xie Weijin, one of the members of the delegation led by Dong Biwu, flew to Nanjing for negotiations with the Kuomintang. Anna who had studied medicine worked as a medical advisor to the New Fourth Army. Later Xie went with the PLA to take part in battles to capture Beijing and Tianjin, and then marched southwards to participate in battles to liberate Wuhan and the areas south of the Yangtze River. In 1949, he came to Beijing and worked with the engineering department of the air force. In 1952, he served as deputy head of the engineering department of the air force. In 1963, he retired and settled down in Nanchong, Sichuan Province. Anna and her own son returned to the Soviet Union. In his home town Xie Weijin adopted a daughter named Xie Jinzhen who looked after him in his later years until he passed away. Many of the things left behind by him are now collected by the National Museum of China.

Tchang Jaui Sau was born in Yutai County, Shandong Province in 1893. His father was a coolie, too poor to send him to school. When he was 18, his father and mother died of illness one after another. He had to enlist in the army and served in the Canal Patrol Battalion for two years. Later, after the battalion was disbanded, he went to his sister in Pukou for help. In 1917, at the height of the First World War, the UK and France badly needed to replenish military supplies, so they recruited laborers from China. Tchang Jaui Sau, being jobless, boarded a ship for France with a complement of around 1,800 laborers, and arrived in Marseilles after a 70-day voyage. He was sent to work in a paper mill. The work was very hard and he lived in a very poor dormitory, suffering much exploitation. In November 1918, Germany surrendered and the First World War ended. France did not need Chinese workers any more. But, facing repatriation, he chose to stay in France―after all, as an orphan he would have to work as hard at home as he did in France. In order to make a living, he did the dirtiest and the most dangerous work that nobody else wanted such as leveling trenches, disinterring corpses, detonating gas bombs, etc. It was not until 1924, on the recommendation of a fellow worker, he got a job in the Renault Car Plant. In 1925, he joined the Communist Party of France and actively took part in the activities organized by the General Confederation of Labor. Renault workers had considerable muscle, and most of the workers were Communist Party members. When the Spanish Civil War broke out, the French Communist Party called on the workers to go to Spain to help the Spanish people fight off the fascists. After thinking it over, he finally decided to join the international volunteers, and arrived in Spain on November 28, 1936. He asked to join the machine gun company, but was assigned to the medical team working as a stretcher-bearer. In rescuing wounded soldiers, he was wounded in the chest, shoulders and hands. When the international volunteers retreated in 1938, he returned to Paris together with the comrades of the French Communist Party. He was arrested by the French government as soon as he arrived in Paris. Helped by the French Communist Party, however, he was released and received donations for traveling expenses given by the trade unions and his fellow workers for him to leave France and return to China by ship. He arrived in Yan’an via Chongqing, returning to the embrace of his motherland after 22 years. Though it was the border area, he felt he was really back home. He was assigned to take care of the storeroom of Jiefang Daily. In 1946 he was married to Meng Xianyue, a child-care worker in the newspaper’s nursery. After liberation, he worked in the administration division of Xinhua News Agency and later was transferred to the personnel division as a secretary. He was commended by Xinhua for his excellent work. In 1958, he retired. In 1968, he fell at the gate of his house and became paralyzed and confined to bed. On December 21, 1968 he passed away at the age of 75.

Liou Kin Tien was born in Shandong in 1890. At home, he once served in the army and fought against bandits. He went to France in 1917 and was assigned to work in a submarine factory. Seven years later, he went to work for the Renault Car Plant. In 1927, he joined the Communist Party of France (CPF). In November 1936, he joined the international volunteers organized by the CPF, and went to Spain together with Tchang Jaui Sau and was assigned to the medical team as a stretcher-bearer. They rescued wounded soldiers under the enemy’s gunfire and their work was more dangerous and harder than ordinary soldiers’. A photo showing Liou Kin Tien rescuing a wounded soldier was found in a picture album published by the Spanish international volunteers and Spanish newspaper Frente Rojo. In the photo, Liou, wearing a steel helmet is carrying on his right shoulder a wounded soldier whose head was bandaged; his right hand is holding the soldier’s thigh and his left hand is holding the soldier’s right hand in front of his chest. The stout Chinese is puffing hard while running past an ambulance. Nineteen years later, this photo was seen again in an East German newspaper. The caption of the photo says: “In praise of international solidarity: Male nurse Liou, a Chinese volunteer fighting for the freedom of Spain, an example of bravery and helping others.” He returned to China together with Tchang Jaui Sau and arrived in Yan’an at the end of 1939. He was sent to study in the Party School of the CPC Central Committee. In 1946, he and Tchang were admitted into the CPC. After graduating from the Party School, he was assigned to work in the Sixth Department of the Party School in charge of construction. He led a team to build cave dwellings and houses, dig ditches and open new roads. He regarded the construction department as his home. It is a pity that we don’t know what happened to him later.

Chang Chi was born into a declined bureaucratic family in Changsha, Hunan Province in 1900. His parents tried their best to give him a good education. They sold off their property, raising enough money for the costs of his first year study in a university and sent him abroad in 1918. He left Shanghai for San Francisco and was enrolled in the University of California-Berkeley studying metallurgical engineering. He got his academic degree in 1923 and found a job as a mining engineer. But, being a Chinese, he was looked down on by others. He had thought of returning home, but could not make up his mind. A few years later, when economic crisis hit the United States, he was fired. He suffered from both poverty and sickness. Having no way out, he felt depressed. He saw that in the United States, a so-called democratic country, there was not only a disparity between rich and poor and racial discrimination, but also its system was rotten to the core. He took part in the anti-hunger demonstration. In the spring of 1935, he joined the Communist Party of the United States in Minnesota State, and in 1936 he became an executive member of The Workers Alliance. He was unmarried and free from care. In April 1937, in response to the call of the Communist Party of the United States, he boarded a ship in New York heading for Spain where he joined the international volunteers. He was assigned to drive a truck in the transportation team. Later because of his health problem, he was transferred to do architectural designing in the general office, and at the same time taught military survey in a college for training military officers. In 1938, he fell ill and was sent to a hospital where he met Xie Weijin, who was also receiving treatment there. They became good friends. Later Chang Chi returned to the United States and soon went to Hong Kong. While waiting in Hong Kong for returning to China, he published articles about Spain’s local conditions and customs and did translation for the China Defense League. He also met Ye Junjian and Israel Epstein (who eventually spent around 60 years in China until his death in 2005). He wished to join the Eighth Route Army when he got back to China, but we don’t know whether his wish was fulfilled.

Chinese Indonesian Tio Oen Bik was born in Java in 1906. After graduating from an Indonesian medical school, he went to the Netherlands for further study, where he joined the Association of the Chinese Indonesians, embraced progressive ideology and was engaged in political activities. In 1937, he took part in the “Aid Spain” movement organized by the Communist Party, and in September he arrived in Spain, working in the medical department of the International Brigades. In October 1938, the International Brigades were disbanded and he was detained in a concentration camp in France. Around 1940, he returned to China to take part in the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression. In Yan’an, he, together with Dr. George Hatem, Dr. Richard Frey, Dr. Fritz Jensen and Dr. Rolf Becker, offered medical services to both Chinese military and civilians. He didn’t leave Yan’an until 1945 when Japan surrendered. After that he still stayed in China and worked in the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration. Later, he went to the Soviet Union and East Germany, and returned to Indonesia around the end of the 1950s.

According to the investigation made by Ni Hwei-ru and Len Y. Tson, there are several other Chinese volunteers of established identity including Aking Chan, Maurice Chen, Liu Huafeng, Li Phon Ling, Su Sen Chang, Paul Yen, Yang Tchen Yon and Chang Chang Kuang. But little is known of their subsequent life or whereabouts.

Over 100 Chinese nationals took part in the Spanish Civil War, and the names of most remain unknown. They shed blood in a foreign land and even their remains did not return to the motherland. We can’t find any more records of their deeds, but the Chinese and Spanish people will forever remember them and cherish their memories.