In 1926, in a modest house on Zhongshan Road in Haikou, the First Congress of the Communist Party of Qiongya was held in secret. There were no grand slogans or fanfare—only a handful of determined men and women planning how to awaken the people of Hainan. This meeting marked the true beginning of the island’s revolutionary movement.
On April 22, 1927, the Kuomintang authorities launched the Four Two Two Incident. More than 2,000 Communists and supporters were arrested, and over 500 were executed. Many gave way under terror, but Feng Baiju and his comrades stood firm. They gathered the survivors, retrieved hidden rifles and makeshift weapons, and organized a revolutionary army.
At dawn on September 23, 1927, their forces attacked Yezizhai near Jiaji Town, firing the first shot of armed resistance on Hainan. Though leaders Yang Shanji and Chen Yongqin died in battle, the spark of revolution had been lit.
In November that year, the Qiongya Special Committee decided to establish a rural revolutionary base. Soon after, the Workers’ and Peasants’ Revolutionary Army captured Lingshui County, setting up the island’s first red regime—the Lingshui County Soviet Government. By the spring of 1928, the red flag had spread across Hainan.
The struggle was long and bitter. In July 1932, the Kuomintang sent 3,000 troops to launch a second encirclement and suppression campaign. Outnumbered and outgunned, the Qiongya Red Army retreated deep into the Mount Murui forests. There they survived for eight months, enduring starvation, cold, and disease. Soldiers ate wild roots, wrapped themselves in leaves, and clung to the belief that the red flag must never be lost.
Their numbers fell from hundreds to twenty-five. Barefoot and starving, they carried the bloodstained red banner pressed to their hearts. In April 1933, they broke through to Changtai Village in Qiongshan County. When the villagers recognized them, they cried out, “The Red Army still lives!” From that moment, the revolution’s flame burned again.
When the War of Resistance Against Japan began, the Qiongya Red Army reorganized as the Qiongya Anti-Japanese Independent Unit, with Feng Baiju as commander. On February 10, 1939, Japanese troops landed at Tianwei Port, and the unit fired Hainan’s first shot of anti-Japanese resistance at the Tangkou Ferry on the Nandu River.
As the Japanese advanced, the Kuomintang authorities retreated into the Wuzhi Mountain region and imposed brutal rule over the Li and Miao ethnic groups. In August 1943, Li leader Wang Guoxing led the Baisha Uprising, rallying his people with machetes and spears. They defeated local Kuomintang forces but were soon forced to retreat into the mountains.
During this time, the Li and Miao insurgents learned that the Qiongya Column fought truly for the people. Wang Guoxing sent representatives to the Communist Party, declaring solidarity. The Qiongya Special Committee immediately sent cadres to assist. They helped reorganize the uprising forces, formed Li and Miao armed units, and promoted policies of rent reduction and tax abolition. These actions gained strong popular support. By mid-1945, most of Baisha had been liberated.
After Japan’s surrender, the Kuomintang reoccupied Hainan, imposing harsh rule and economic plunder. In response, the Qiongya Column fought to preserve its liberated zones. In October 1946, the Qiongya Special Committee decided to merge Baisha, Baoting, and Ledong into one continuous revolutionary base.
By early 1947, Party and army headquarters moved to Maogui Village in Baisha. The troops captured Shuiman and Baoting, overthrew enemy strongholds in Fanyangdong, and consolidated the base area. In 1948, the liberated zones of Baisha, Ledong, and Baoting connected, forming the Wuzhi Mountain Revolutionary Base—Hainan’s firm red heartland.
On the morning of September 28, 1949, Wang Lugui, head of the Qiongya West District radio station, received an urgent telegram from the Qiongya Column Headquarters: “Immediately receive the Xinhua News Agency’s Instructions for the Design of the Flag of the People’s Republic of China.” The new China was about to be born, and Hainan was determined to raise its first Five-Star Red Flag.
That night, Nationalist troops suddenly surrounded the village. Wang quickly hid the radio set in straw and climbed into an old banyan tree with his operator. Soldiers searched below with torches, their voices echoing in the dark. The two men held their breath until the danger passed.
At 3 a.m., faint radio waves reached the receiver. By the light of an oil lamp, Wang transcribed more than 650 lines of code, deciphering the design of the new national flag: a red background with five yellow stars—one large, four small.
Red cloth was easy to find, but yellow dye was not. When the problem reached the local villagers, the Li and Miao people volunteered to help. They gathered yellow ginger from the mountains, crushed it to extract dye, and repeatedly soaked and dried white cloth until it turned golden. Around a dim lamp, the villagers cut the yellow cloth into stars and stitched them carefully onto the red fabric. Fingers bled, but no one stopped. In the midst of war and hardship, Hainan’s first Five-Star Red Flag was born.
That flag, made by hand in secrecy, became the symbol of an unbroken spirit. It marked not only the dawn of a new nation but also the perseverance of generations who refused to surrender.
Seventy years later, the flag remains one of Hainan’s most precious revolutionary relics. In 2019, Wu Xiaoyuan, daughter of Wu Kezhi, former Deputy Commander of the Qiongya Column, visited the Wuzhishan Revolutionary Memorial Park. Standing before the replica of that flag, she touched its seams gently and told the younger visitors, “When I tell you stories about them, I must begin with this flag. It witnessed victory—but more than that, it holds the convictions of his generation.”
Today, the same wind that once carried gunfire across Hainan’s hills now ripples the red flag high above peaceful towns. It reminds all who see it that on this island, even when the light was faintest and hope seemed lost, the people’s faith never wavered. The red flag never fell—and it never will.
Source: neac gov, Xinhua, China Daily, sohu, ifeng
