Liu Zhixun (; November 1898 – September 14, 1932), also known as Liu Keming (), was a member of the

Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army The Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army or Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army, commonly known as the Chinese Red Army or simply the Red Army, are the armed forces of the Chinese Communist Party. It was formed when Communist ...

. He was purged by Communist leader

Xia Xi Xia Xi (; 17 August 1901 – 28 February 1936), also known as Man Bo () and Lao Xia (), was an early leader of the Chinese Communist Party and a member of the 28 Bolsheviks. Biography Xia was born in Yiyang, Hunan Province. He studied at Y ...

and executed.

Biography

He was born in

Changsha Changsha (; ; ; Changshanese pronunciation: (), Standard Chinese, Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is the Capital city, capital and the largest city of Hunan Province of China. Changsha is the 17th most populous city in China with a popul ...

Hunan Hunan (, ; ) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, part of the South Central China region. Located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze watershed, it borders the province-level divisions of Hubei to the north, Jiangxi ...

Province. His father was an acquaintance of

Yang Changji Yang Changji (; 21 April 1871 – 17 January 1920) was a Chinese educator, philosopher, and writer. After advanced studies in Japan and Europe, he taught at Hunan First Normal University, where he exerted considerable influence on Mao Zedong, C ...

, father of

Mao Zedong Mao Zedong pronounced ; also romanised traditionally as Mao Tse-tung. (26 December 1893 – 9 September 1976), also known as Chairman Mao, was a Chinese communist revolutionary who was the founder of the People's Republic of China (PRC) ...

's first wife

Yang Kaihui Yáng Kāihuì (; courtesy name: Yúnjǐn (); 6 November 1901 – 14 November 1930) was the second wife of Mao Zedong, whom he married in 1920. She had three children with Mao Zedong: Mao Anying, Mao Anqing, and Mao Anlong. Her father w ...

. He was educated at the

Yali School Yali High School (), also known as Yali () is a junior/senior high school located in Changsha, Hunan Province in the People's Republic of China, or a group of secondary schools containing Yali School itself and several branches. It is a first-tie ...

in Changsha (which was at the time an American-run private school). In 1919, he led a boycott of Japanese imports. He joined the

Communist Party of China The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victorious in the Chinese Civil ...

in February 1924, at the invitation of

He Shuheng He Shuheng (; 7 May 1876 – 24 February 1935) was a Chinese Communist revolutionary, born in Ningxiang, Hunan province. Biography In 1914, He made acquaintance with Mao Zedong while at Hunan Normal University, and the two would eventually ...

. In that same year he joined the faculty of the Changsha Normal School (now

Changsha Normal University Changsha Normal University () is a university located in Changsha, Hunan, China. As of fall 2013, the university has two campuses, a combined student body of 10,000 students, 600 faculty members. The university consists of 10 departments, wi ...

). He married Li Shuyi, who was introduced to him by Yang Kaihui. In July 1926, the armies of the

Northern Expedition The Northern Expedition was a military campaign launched by the National Revolutionary Army (NRA) of the Kuomintang (KMT), also known as the "Chinese Nationalist Party", against the Beiyang government and other regional warlords in 1926. The ...

arrived in Hunan, and Liu was tasked to set up a provincial government. In December 1926, he was made secretary-general. On May 21, 1927, after the breakdown of relations between the

Kuomintang The Kuomintang (KMT), also referred to as the Guomindang (GMD), the Nationalist Party of China (NPC) or the Chinese Nationalist Party (CNP), is a major political party in the Republic of China, initially on the Chinese mainland and in Tai ...

and the communists and the start of the

Chinese Civil War The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang-led government of the Republic of China and forces of the Chinese Communist Party, continuing intermittently since 1 August 1927 until 7 December 1949 with a Communist victory on m ...

, Liu participated in the ''Mari Incident'' in Changsha. In July 1927, he met with

He Long He Long (; March 22, 1896 – June 9, 1969) was a Chinese Communist revolutionary and one of the ten marshals of the People's Liberation Army. He was from a poor rural family in Hunan, and his family was not able to provide him with any formal ...

to prepare for the Nanchang Uprising of August 1, 1927. After the failure of the Nanchang Uprising, he fled to

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...

, where his English language skills enabled him to contact the

Swire Group Swire Group () is a Hong Kong- and London-based British conglomerate. Many of its core businesses can be found within the Asia Pacific region, where traditionally Swire's operations have centred on Hong Kong and mainland China. Within Asia, ...

in Sai Kung. He later went to

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...

and in September 1928 to

Tianjin Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popu ...

. In 1929 he was put in charge of the communists in

Hubei Hubei (; ; alternately Hupeh) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, and is part of the Central China region. The name of the province means "north of the lake", referring to its position north of Dongting Lake. The ...

Province. In April 1930, he went to

Honghu Honghu () is a county-level city in the municipal region of Jingzhou, in the south of Hubei province. The city lies on the northwest (left) bank of the Yangtze River, across from Hunan Province and Xianning, Hubei. It is named after the adjacent ...

, a town in Hubei under communist control. In June 1931, he organized in the communist strongholds in northwestern Hubei. In August 1931, a guerrilla force was created. In January 1932, his district was brought under the jurisdiction of the Hunan-Western Hubei Soviet. Liu opposed the efforts of

, one of the

28 Bolsheviks The 28 (and a half) Bolsheviks (二十八个半布尔什维克) were a group of Chinese students who studied at the Moscow Sun Yat-sen University from the late 1920s until early 1935, also known as the "Returned Students". The university was found ...

, to carry out a purge of the Soviets. Xia framed Liu and 1,500 other communists as being secret members of the Kuomintang's Anti-Bolshevik group. Liu was brought to

Jianli County Jianli () is a county-level city of southern Hubei Province, China, located on the northern (left) bank of the Yangtze River and bordering Hunan Province to the south. It is under the administration of Jingzhou City. The character ''jian'' (/) ...

and killed.

Legacy

Liu's widow Li Shuyi did not know of his death until 1934. He was politically rehabilitated in 1945. In 1957, after the founding of the

People's Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

, Mao Zedong wrote a

Reply to Li Shuyi Reply to Li Shuyi () is a poem written on May 11, 1957 by Mao Zedong to Li Shuyi, a friend of Mao's first wife Yang Kaihui and the widow of the executed Communist leader Liu Zhixun. In the poem, "poplar" refers to Yang Kaihui, whose surname Yang ...

to Liu's widow.永远的丰碑——柳直荀：“杨柳轻飏直上重霄九
Liu was also survived by his father and two young children.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Liu, Zhixun 1898 births 1932 deaths Executed Republic of China people People from Changsha Executed people from Hunan Chinese Red Army generals Chinese Communist Party politicians from Hunan