Fuping Martyrs' Cemetery

Fuping Martyrs' Cemetery

Fuping Martyrs' Cemetery is a cultural tourism attraction and a classic red tourism site.

Fuping Martyrs' Cemetery

The Fuping County Revolutionary Martyrs' Cemetery was built in December 1959 and is located on the mountainside of Xiaopai Mountain, north of Dongsi Street in the county town. There are 66 stone steps leading from the flat ground up to the main gate of the cemetery, which is inscribed with four gilded characters: “Martyrs’ Cemetery.” In front of the gate stands a plaster statue of a People’s Liberation Army soldier holding a rifle and charging forward. The entire cemetery covers an area of 40,000 square meters and is divided into upper, middle, and lower courtyards. The east and west wing rooms in the middle courtyard serve as exhibition halls, while the main hall in the upper courtyard is the Martyrs’ Memorial Hall, totaling 29 rooms, including two octagonal pavilions. The layout of the cemetery is rigorous, with distinct levels and elegant, solemn architecture. Every year during the Spring Festival and the Lantern Festival, local residents often come to pay their respects, and during Tomb-Sweeping Day, teachers and students frequently visit to honor the martyrs. In 1986, the county government invested another 150,000 yuan to build an octagonal pavilion at the top of the hill behind the cemetery and two hexagonal pavilions halfway up the mountain, adding even more grandeur to the site. The Martyrs’ Hall in the county cemetery houses memorial plaques for 1,123 revolutionary martyrs. Outside the cemetery, there are tombstones for hundreds of revolutionary martyrs, including those of General Hui Guang, commander of the 24th Army, and Red Army soldiers; graves and monuments for Eighth Route Army martyrs; a monument erected by the people of Fuping commemorating the Autumn 1943 Anti-“Mopping-Up” Campaign; the “Pingyang Thousand-People Tomb” stele; the “Loyal Souls Stele” erected by the Jin-Cha-Ji Daily for fallen comrades; and the “Heroes’ Souls Stele” erected by the Jin-Cha-Ji Bulletin for comrades, spanning a wide range of time periods, with a large number of monuments and notable figures among the honorees—features rarely seen in cemeteries across the country. It can be called a “forest of martyrs’ monuments.”