Address: Shuixi village, Zhuze town, Liyang, Changzhou, Jiangsu province Opening hours: 8:30 am to 4:30 pm Admission: Free
The Memorial Hall of the New Fourth Army's Jiangnan Command in Jiangsu province [Photo/Official WeChat account of the Memorial Hall of the New Fourth Army's Jiangnan Command]
As a revolutionary memorial, the Memorial Hall of the New Fourth Army's Jiangnan Command in Jiangsu province is dedicated to the protection and management of the command’s original site, as well as for collecting, researching, curating and promoting revolutionary artifacts and historical materials.
The memorial hall now covers an area of 50,000 square meters, with 10,000 square meters dedicated to exhibition. It is divided into three main sections: The core area, the cluster of historical sites in Shuixi village, and the cluster of sites of the 1st Detachment Command of the New Fourth Army in Songxiang Lane.
In 1938, Su Yu (1907-84), Chen Yi (1901-72), and Zhang Dingcheng (1898-1981) led the New Fourth Army’s vanguard detachment and its first and second detachments respectively, advancing from southern Anhui province into the enemy-occupied areas of southern Jiangsu province to launch guerrilla warfare against the Japanese invaders. In 1939, the Jiangnan Command of the New Fourth Army was established in Shuixi, with Chen Yi serving as commander and Su Yu as deputy commander. The command unified leadership over the first and second detachments as well as local armed forces of the war against Japanese aggression in southern Jiangsu. In 1940, Chen Yi and Su Yu led the Jiangnan Command and its main forces across the Yangtze River to the north.
During this period, Chen Yi and Su Yu resolutely implemented the correct directives of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China. Based on the realities of the war against Japanese aggression in southern Jiangsu, they creatively applied the Party’s three major tools—united front, armed struggle, and Party building—to establish, consolidate, and expand an base area to fight against Japanese invaders centered in Shuixi village.
