Inscription for Du Bincheng’s Mourning Verse[1]

(October 9, 1948)

To die for the people, though dead, is still alive.

[1] Du Bincheng (1888–1947), a native of Mizhi, Shaanxi, was a patriotic democratic personage. He served as Chief Counsellor of Yang Hucheng’s Seventeenth Route Army and played a positive role in facilitating Yang Hucheng’s acceptance of the Chinese Communist Party’s policy of the Anti-Japanese National United Front. After victory in the War of Resistance Against Japan, he served as a Standing Committee member of the Central Committee of the China Democratic League and concurrently as Chairman of its Northwest General Branch. In 1947, he was murdered by the Kuomintang reactionaries in Xi’an. Chairman Mao Zedong inscribed this mourning verse for Du Bincheng’s sacrifice.