Wugang Papaya Bridge

Wugang Papaya Bridge

The Wugang Papaya Bridge is a cultural relic protection unit of Hunan Province.

The Papaya Bridge, also known as the Red Army Bridge, is located east of Papaya Village in Dengyuantai Town, approximately 15 kilometers southwest of Wugang City. Spanning the Zi River from east to west, it serves as a vital transportation route connecting Papaya Village and Shazhouping. The original construction date of the bridge is unknown. In the 50th year of the Qing Kangxi reign (1711), a bridge pavilion was added, and in the 8th year of the Tongzhi reign (1869), the bridge was rebuilt. It has a total length of 44 meters and a width of 4.7 meters. The structure features four piers and five arches, with wooden layers stacked on the piers and wooden beams spanning the arches, stepping upward layer by layer. Stone slabs are placed on top of the wooden structure to weigh it down and secure it, forming a 12-row wooden corridor. At both ends of the bridge corridor are blue brick archways, with the three characters “木瓜桥” (Papaya Bridge) in regular script molded in clay above the gateways. The couplet on the gate is also in regular script: “Leaves fall before the pavilion, amidst the deep autumn of the Zi River, as night rains sweep across garden trees; melon fields stretch along the bank, where green plains and morning mist connect with distant clouds.”

In December 1930, amid the thunderous roar of battle, the 7th Army of the Chinese Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army, led by Li Mingrui, Zhang Yunyi, and Deng Xiaoping, departed its birthplace in Baise, Guangxi. Crossing from Guangxi into Hunan, they arrived in Wugang. Upon hearing that soldiers were approaching from Guangxi, the villagers of Papaya Village were struck with terror, immediately recalling the ransacking, burning, and killing carried out by the 5,000-strong forces of Guangxi warlord Shen Hongying when they raided the village in October of the 15th year of the Republic of China (1926). To avoid another catastrophe, fleeing their homes became the villagers’ only option. In just one afternoon, the entire village became deserted and devoid of any human presence.

As dusk fell, villagers hiding in the mountains—still shaken—dimly spotted a force of about 3,000 troops approaching from the northwest. They first crossed Papaya Bridge, then slowly entered the village. “Their equipment was rudimentary, their clothes tattered. Even though it was winter, they were dressed in thin garments, each carrying only a gray military blanket.” (Excerpt from “Early Accounts of the Red Army Passing Through,” by Xiao Jianfa) At the time, the villagers had no idea these were the Red Army, so none dared to come down from the mountains. Fearful, they spent a sleepless night in the hills.

“The Red Army left the village early the next morning in neat formation,” recalled octogenarian villagers He Songlin, Zhang Yijiao, and Lu Yuehai. “Still wary of danger, we stayed in the mountains for a while longer. Only after we were certain the troops had truly gone did we cautiously make our way down.”

The villagers were stunned. Everything before their eyes was beyond their imagination: the once dirty and messy areas around the houses had been cleaned spotlessly, the door locks of every household still hung intact, and the chickens and ducks, with nowhere to hide, wandered and foraged in the yards and threshing grounds as usual. And at the western end of Papaya Bridge and nearby vegetable fields, the villagers made a new discovery—the slogans written in red soil by the Red Army soldiers not only told the villagers what kind of army they were through words, but also demonstrated through action that this was an army of the people. In the vegetable fields, many pits where radishes had been pulled out were found, and in each fresh pit, a copper coin had been placed...

“They were the Red Army. This unit was the 7th Army of the Chinese Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army, led by Deng Xiaoping, Li Mingrui, and Zhang Yunyi.” The elders never forgot those events, especially the copper coins left in the radish pits: “Later, we learned that by the time they reached here, they had fought thousands of miles with scarce ammunition and supplies. Since all the villagers had run away, and they couldn’t bear to break into their homes, they endured the biting northern winds and camped under the bridge corridor and eaves. When hungry, they had no choice but to pull radishes from the fields to eat. To avoid causing losses to the villagers, they placed a copper coin in each radish pit...”

Papaya Bridge is a historical witness to the passage of the Red Seventh Army through Wugang. It is also the site of a temporary wartime command post set up during the Xiangxi Campaign of the Anti-Japanese War in May 1945. The Nationalist Army’s Tang Enbo Group, under the order of General Mu Tingfang, commander of the 94th Army, relocated from Zhenyuan, Guizhou, to Wugang to block the Japanese invaders. In addition to retaining the architectural style of late Qing Dynasty bridges in southern China—with its valuable cultural significance—the bridge’s historical value is equally important and should not be overlooked. We have every reason to preserve it better, allowing stories like “copper coins in the radish pits” to be passed down, moving generation after generation...

Further Reading:

· Ninth Batch of Cultural Relic Protection Units of Hunan Province