Monument to Martyr Xie Wenjin

Monument to Martyr Xie Wenjin

The Monument to Martyr Xie Wenjin is a classic site for red tourism.

Xie Wenjin (1894–1927) was from Pan Kou Village, Yongjia County. In 1911, he was admitted to Zhejiang Provincial No. 10 Middle School (now Wenzhou High School), and later enrolled in Hangzhou Provincial First Normal School. In the autumn of 1917, after graduation, he returned to his hometown to run Yantou Higher Primary School, actively promoting new culture and ideas, earning high esteem among teachers, students, and the public. In the spring of 1919, he left his hometown for Shanghai to work at the magazine New Youth. In August 1920, he joined the Socialist Youth League in Shanghai. In April 1921, assigned by the Party, he went with Liu Shaoqi, Ren Bishi, Luo Yinong, Xiao Jinguang, and others to study at the Communist University of the Toilers of the East in Moscow. On December 7 of the following year, he became a member of the Chinese Communist Party at the university, making him one of the first dozen or so revolutionary intellectuals from China to study in the Soviet Union. In the winter of 1923, he returned to China and served as secretary to the Central Committee of the CPC and as an interpreter for Comintern representative and Soviet military-political advisor Mikhail Borodin. In August 1924, he was sent by the CPC Central Committee back to his hometown to establish party and league organizations. In December, he founded the earliest communist organization in southern Zhejiang — the Wenzhou Independent Branch of the CPC. After the May 30th Incident, he participated in leading the Shanghai workers' movement. In April 1925, his article “Lenin and the Peasants” was published in the special Lenin memorial issue of New Youth. The article was highly praised by Mao Zedong and selected as teaching material for the sixth session of the Guangzhou Peasant Movement Training Institute. After 1926, Xie Wenjin served as a member of the CPC Shanghai District Committee and Secretary of the CPC Nanjing District Committee, among other roles. On April 10, 1927, Xie Wenjin held an emergency expanded meeting of the CPC Nanjing District Committee at No. 10 Dasamao Lane, Nanjing. At 2 a.m., detectives from the Kuomintang Public Security Bureau suddenly surrounded the venue. Xie Wenjin and 10 others were arrested and later executed.

The Monument to Martyr Xie Wenjin is located in Pan Kou Village, Pan Kou Township, Yongjia County, and was built in 1992. The monument stands 5.5 meters tall and is 1.05 meters wide. The front of the monument bears the inscription “Eternal Glory to Martyr Xie Wenjin,” written by Zhang Aiping, with a red five-pointed star on top. Below the inscription on the front is an engraved biography of the martyr. The base of the monument is 1.6 meters long and 1.4 meters wide, enclosed by bluestone railings. The square around the base can accommodate over a hundred people. Xie Wenjin’s former residence is also in Pan Kou Village. It is an ancient house built in the 22nd year of the Guangxu reign of the Qing Dynasty (1894), covering an area of 650 square meters, with seven main rooms, six wing rooms, a front gate tower, a central courtyard, and furnishings used by Xie Wenjin during his lifetime, such as wooden beds, cabinets, and an eight-immortal table.

The Monument to Martyr Xie Wenjin is a cultural relic protection unit of Yongjia County and a patriotism education base of Wenzhou City.

Source: Party History Research Office of the CPC Wenzhou Municipal Committee

Xie Wenjin (1894–1927) was born in 1894 in Yongjia County, Zhejiang Province. He graduated from Hangzhou Provincial First Normal School in 1917. In 1919, he went to Shanghai to work for the magazine New Youth. In 1920, he joined the Socialist Youth League and participated in the early organization of the Communist Party in Shanghai, joining the CPC in 1921. Soon after, Xie Wenjin, along with Liu Shaoqi, Ren Bishi, Luo Yinong, and Xiao Jinguang, was sent by the Party to study at the Communist University of the Toilers of the East in Moscow. In the spring of 1924, Xie Wenjin returned to China and served as an interpreter for the Comintern representative and Soviet military-political advisor... More details about Xie Wenjin ++