Interview with Rong Shutang

Rong Shutang (b. 1920) is a resident of Shaziying Village, Yang Town, Shunyi District, Beijing and he was a teacher before retirement. In this interview, Rong recalled what happened before the Liberation and during the Land Reform as well as the later checkup. During the Sino-Japanese War, there were Red Eye Army who claimed to fight against Japanese but in fact were just bandits with secret relationship to the Communist party. The Communist party did not arrive in the village until 1937. Ever since then, they always held secret meetings with poor people in the evenings. During the Land Reform, many people had to forgo and move out of their own places for collectivization, but there was no standard criteria. Whoever refused to follow the orders would be beaten up. Many teachers, including Rong himself suffered ill-treatment during the checkup—wrongly accused, beaten up and even beaten to death.

荣树堂1920年出生于北京市顺义区杨镇沙子营村，退休前当了一辈子教师。在这段口述中，荣老人回忆了解放前的日子和当年沙营子村土改、扫房、复查的情况。抗日战争时期先有的红眼军，明着抗日实际上是土匪，但也和共产党有关系，后来37年以后慢慢开始有了共产党，经常晚上开秘密穷人会。扫房没有固定标准，被选中就必须搬走，不然就要挨打。复查期间很多教师也受到了不合理待遇，不少人被冤枉、挨打，甚至被打死，老人自己也挨了批斗。

Transcripts for this interview and more may be available under the ‘Documents’ link above. 采访抄录和相关内容，请点击查看上面的’Documents’链接。