Shen Family Garden

Shen Family Garden

Shen Family Garden is a Shanghai Municipal Cultural Relics Protection Unit.

Shen Family Garden is located on the north side of Nanqiao Cultural Square, within the compound of the entrance to the District People's Congress Standing Committee (No. 502, Jiefang Middle Road). Built in the 1920s, it is the only surviving garden in Fengxian District to date. The owner, Shen Menglian, was originally a boatman who made his fortune through salt smuggling. Later, he was recruited by the Qing government and successively held positions such as commander of the Navy’s Anti-Smuggling Corps, leader of the Songjiang Military-Political Sub-Government, and director of the Jiangsu Provincial Water Affairs Bureau.

The "Draft Annals of Fengxian County" compiled in the late Republican era recorded that this garden was “built by Shen Menglian after returning from his official career. The northern part consists of residences, all three stories high, featuring modern Western-style architecture; the southern part is the garden, lush with flowers and trees, with stone benches lined up, making it a scenic destination.” To build this garden, Shen acquired 24 acres of land at the time and constructed a dedicated kiln to produce bricks for his own use. There is even a folk ballad in Fengxian that tells this story. Shen had considerable influence in local society, so shortly after the completion of the garden residence, when his daughter got married, he hosted an extravagant banquet in the garden. Even prominent figures in Shanghai, such as Du Yuesheng, came to celebrate. In August 1937, during the “August 13th” War of Resistance, General Zhang Fakui of the Nationalist Eighth Route Army was stationed in Nanqiao, overseeing the defense of Pudong. He often visited Shen Family Garden to take a bath, accompanied by guards, because the Shen family had their own water tower for water supply. It is said that the pumping motor was a gift from Du Yuesheng. In late August of the same year, when Guo Moruo, Xia Yan, Tian Han, and others visited Nanqiao together, Zhang Fakui specifically recommended the place to Guo Moruo. Guo later gave a clear account of this in his essay “Going to and Returning from Pudong” (found in Volume 8 of the 1958 edition of “The Collected Works of Guo Moruo”): “Xianghua (Zhang Fakui) wanted to keep me there longer. He said there was a grand Western-style house available for me to stay in, fully equipped, and of course, with a bathroom.” The so-called “grand Western-style house” referred to the main building in Shen Family Garden. This building was not only large in scale but also uniquely laid out. Typically, pavilions in gardens are built on the ground or on hills, but Shen Family Garden has two rest pavilions built at the southeast and southwest corners of the third floor of the main building, giving the entire main structure and the garden an innovative and elegant feel.

On November 5, 1937, Japanese aircraft bombed the building. Fortunately, one bomb only destroyed several bungalows on the north side of the main building, and another only punctured the roof of the ancestral hall on the west side of the main building. In 1939, the Nationalist Chinese Loyal and Righteous Salvation Army set fire to the roof of the main building, which had to be covered with straw. As a result, there is a local saying: “The collapsed skin poses as a lord (referring to Xu Jinshan, the puppet town mayor of Nanqiao during the Japanese puppet regime), while the building is roofed with straw,” but the main building remained largely intact.

After the liberation, Shen Family Garden became the site of the Fengxian County Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and the Fengxian County People's Government. Despite multiple renovations and alterations, it has largely retained its original garden characteristics. The garden is planted with a variety of flowers and trees such as wintersweet, cedar, magnolia, osmanthus, citrus, banana plants, peonies, roses, and peonies, making it a green jewel nestled among the urban buildings of the county and attracting passersby to stop and admire it. On April 4, 2014, it was designated as a municipal-level cultural relics protection unit.