After making a thorough analysis and appraisal of each man, we switched over to combat training, during which “officers teach soldiers, soldiers teac… - Peng Dehuai

I was born into a lower-middle peasant family on the 10th day of the 9th moon on the lunar calendar in 1898. All my family had at that time were a few thatched huts on eight or nine mu (hectre) of fallow and hilly land. We planted sweet potatoes and cotton on the fallow land and palms, tea, China fir and bamboo on the hill. Working hard and living frugally, the eight of us — my granduncle, grandmother, my parents and four boys barely managed to make ends meet.

Our goal was illegal (revolution), and legality was but a means of achieving that goal. Otherwise we would have been using legality for the sake of legality and would have become the will.

Attack without delay the reactionary county government of Pingjiang, the “civil corps”, the village suppression units and the village suppression committees. Wipe them out resolutely. We are rising in arms! The day has come to serve the workers and peasants!