“Valley Forge and Yan’an: Common Roots in Revolution,” Essay, Philip D. Wetjen.
In this essay Philip D. Wetjen offers a comparative analysis of two revolutionary events, one in what would become the United States the other in China. As Wetjen argues, by seeing similarities in the founding the federated republic of the United States and the Peoples’ Republic of China we can better understand how these two countries emerged from a period of revolutionary struggle. An earlier, shortened version, of this essay first appeared in Critical Asian Studies.
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In the early evening of December 19, 1777, leading elements of George Washington’s Continental Army began filtering into Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. The army was in a desperate state, cold, hungry and exhausted from a series of campaigns that had resulted in repeated defeats across southeast Pennsylvania. The army was in poor health and ill equipped, with men joining horses in hauling cannon and munitions. By some estimates up to a quarter of the soldiers lacked shoes. Despite the Americans confronting the British at Brandywine Creek in early September, on September 26th the British had successfully occupied Philadelphia, the capital of the new nation. American officials had retreated to Lancaster, and then further west to York, in an attempt to provide continuity of government.
Washington’s troops engaged the British army in late October in Germantown and as late as December 8th in Whitemarsh. Following the battle at Whitemarsh, the British withdrew back into the safety of fortifications surrounding Philadelphia and General Washington issued orders for the army to make its way to Valley Forge to establish winter quarters.
Washington’s Lieutenants had identified Valley Forge as a potential winter camp back in late October, after it had become clear the British would probably not be forced out of Philadelphia. Approximately twenty miles outside the capital, Valley Forge commanded high ground overlooking the area known as the Great Valley and was protected from the rear by the Schuylkill River. Valley Forge’s location was certainly defendable and could assist in portraying an image that Washington’s army was keeping the British bottled up in Philadelphia. But the fact is, by December 19th the exhausted army could not have proceeded any further.
In the late afternoon of October 19, 1935, the lead marchers of the First Front Army of the Chinese Communist Party found themselves in the village of Wuqi (Wuqizhen township, Shaanxi Province). The First Front Army had been on the move for a full year, having escaped from encirclement by Chiang Kai-Shek’s Kuomintang forces far to the south in Jiangxi province in October of the previous year. In what amounted to a series of separate marches consisting of strategic retreats and rearguard actions, the army had been decimated as much by the harsh terrain and elements as by the Nationalist forces. Approximately 86,000 Red Army soldiers had survived the initial 40-day breakout from the ring of Kuomintang blockhouses in October of 1934. However, in the ensuing battle of Xiang they lost a full 50% of their fighting forces.
By the time the remnants of the First Front Army entered the ‘Yellow River Plateau’ area, only about 8,000 remained. This area is known as the ‘Loess Plateau’, with the ‘loess’ referring to the dusty soil, yellow colored and continually blown up by the unceasing wind. This wind had sculpted the landscape of the plateau into an unending series of carved ravines, through which the occasional oxcart trail meandered. The army had been following these trails through loess country for three weeks before arriving in Wuqi. They had been informed that this area of Shaanxi province was under Communist control, and the army must have begun to feel some relief at being out of immediate danger. They had crossed eighteen mountain ranges and twenty-four rivers to finally arrive in Shaanxi, enduring fatigue, desertions, food shortages, and attacks by both Kuomintang forces and local tribes. But to the core cadre of the First Front Army, natives of the lush and verdant valleys of southern China who had travelled the entire long arc across the huge country, Wuqi must have felt like they had suddenly found themselves among the craters of the moon.
Immediately upon arrival in Valley Forge, Washington’s officer corps began looking for local housing for Washington himself and the senior members of his staff. However, Washington had made it clear he would reside in his tent until all continental soldiers had been adequately housed. Since the prevailing opinion was that the British would not leave their comfortable quarters in the occupied capital, more sturdy semi-permanent housing should be constructed for the troops at Valley Forge. A standard design was drafted with twelve soldiers per hut. Given the approximate 11,000 soldiers, plus various support personnel, it’s estimated that at least 1,300 of the structures were built. Since the soldiers enlisted by the particular state they came from, the huts were located in various state-oriented neighborhoods around the 3500-acre encampment. Only when all the shelters were completed did Washington move into the home of Isaac Potts, for which he paid rent for the duration of the encampment.
Although shelter was being secured before the end of December, the army’s overall condition remained dire. Food was in extremely short supply, and the lack of adequate clothing for the winter weather had not been addressed. By some accounts, Christmas dinner consisted of rice and vinegar. Another common meal was said to be ‘fire cake’, made with flour and water cooked over low heat on campfire stones. By the end of the winter it was estimated that 1,000 soldiers had died, and a greater number of the horses essential for army movement had also been lost.
Only well into the new year did conditions begin to improve. A visit by key members of a congressional delegation on January 24th resulted in increased funding for the army and a greater focus on logistical support and supply. General Nathanael Greene, a gifted tactician, reluctantly agreed to take on the role of Quartermaster General, responsible for the overall support and supply chain of the army.
Within the encampment, the arrival of Baron Friedrich von Steuben proved to be truly revolutionary for the common soldier. Von Steuben was the quintessential drill master, inspired by the American cause and recently arrived from Europe. Although he admired the spirit and loyalty of the American troops, he was appalled by their lack of basic discipline. The central part of the encampment was a large, relatively flat area that became the parade ground. Von Steuben drilled the troops there on a continual basis and began to slowly overcome their focus on the individual states they came from, and instead function as a unified Continental Army.
However, the material improvements fostered by Greene and the technical advances promoted by von Steuben paled in comparison to the impact General Washington had on the troops. His leadership, more than anything else, forged the bonds that allowed the army to survive the winter intact and begin to come together as a fighting unit in the spring. Soldiers whose enlistment period was up during the winter months almost uniformly agreed to ‘re-up’ based on their personal loyalty to Washington.
And on May 6th, well into the Pennsylvania spring season, the army received word that France had signed an agreement back on February 6th establishing a military alliance between France and the newly formed United States of America. This news, along with the supplies provided via General Greene’s efforts and the confidence inspired by Baron von Steuben, raised the morale of the American troops to the highest level of the war. When the army broke camp on June 19th, 1778, residents of Valley Forge were astounded at the positive changes in the army that had occurred over the preceding six months.
The only indication to the First Front Army that they had actually arrived in a communist controlled area were painted characters stating ‘Long Live the Communist Party’ on a few of the dilapidated buildings in Wuqi. This area of Shaanxi province was under the control of the 25th and 26th Red Armies, relatively small contingents under the command of Liu Zhidan. However, they were nowhere to be seen in Wuqi. Liu Zhidan had a close relationship with Mao Zedong, and Mao’s knowledge of Liu’s approximate location in Shaanxi was the reason the First Army had identified the Yellow River Plateau as the endpoint of their journey north. Other, and more senior leaders of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) had disagreed on a strategy and direction for the retreat from Jiangxi. But Mao’s logic had prevailed at every crisis point. Mao may not have been in command at the outset of the march, but by the time the First Army had arrived in Wuqi, Mao was firmly in charge.
The journey north is legendary in the history of the CCP and is reverently referred to as “The Long March”. Although originally characterized as a retreat or withdrawal, as the troops neared Shaanxi province the first references to ‘The Long March’ surfaced. Besides the aforementioned eighteen mountain ranges and twenty-four rivers, the First Army had engaged in a series of maneuvers conducted in the style of a very effective guerilla war. Military historians often cite the fact that one of the most difficult campaigns to execute is an effective retreat under constant threat from the enemy. That Mao Zedong was able to lead the First Army through this year-long ordeal is a testament to his leadership and was the single greatest contributor to his growing stature in the CCP. Of particular note was his marshalling of the Red Army’s limited resources in the six-week period from February 11 to March 22, 1935. During this time Mao out-maneuvered Chiang Kai Shek’s vastly larger force, ordering the Red Army to cross the Chishui River four separate times while leaving a skeletal force to hold the Kuomintang army’s attention. After the March 22 success, the First Red Army was able to embark on the long arc that would eventually take them to Shaanxi.
Although The Long March could be regarded as complete by the First Front Army upon arrival in Wuqi, it wasn’t until a year later (October 1936) that Mao’s First Front Army united with the Second and Fourth Armies in Huining County in neighboring Gansu province. This reunion of the three armies that had separated down in Jiangxi back in October of 1934 truly marked the end of The Long March. In the meantime, Mao had moved his command from Wuqi to nearby Bao’an, a two day walk for the army. Boa’an became the center of CCP activity until late 1936, when all personnel and equipment moved a few miles south and east to Yan’an, a small city in a narrow valley on the Yan River, which meandered east and eventually joined the Yellow River.
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For the last twenty-three years I have resided in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, about a fifteen- minute drive from Valley Forge National Historical Park. Along with being a family favorite for summer picnics, Valley Forge is our default destination for entertaining out of town visitors. The 3500 acres make for a beautiful setting in all four seasons.
At this point I have brought visitors from quite a few countries to Valley Forge – among them the UK, France, Serbia, the Czech Republic, Mexico, India and Germany. And in every case, there is a presumption among the visitors that there must have been a great battle at this site. When I explain that’s not the case, they are quite mystified. Yes, it’s a beautiful park, but why is it ‘historical’ – what is so special about this place. And then I begin my story.
I start with setting the scene, explaining the war for independence and exactly what stage the conflict was in as the winter of 1777 approached. All the visitors have indeed heard of George Washington and have an understanding of the two sides involved in the conflict. But beyond that, they know few details. We begin by visiting one of the huts. Although none of the original structures have survived, the Park has constructed and maintained a number of huts that approximate what Washington’s troops lived in. Many of these are open to entry, allowing visitors to visualize exactly what life was like for the troops residing in them. I ask them to imagine standing guard duty in 25F temperatures and returning to a hut where, with a blazing fire, they might achieve an indoor temperature of around 40 degrees. And that in the initial days of the encampment many of the soldiers lacked winter clothing, including shoes.
We next go to Washington’s headquarters. With emphasis on two facts: that Washington did not take up residence in the Isaac Potts house until every continental soldier was housed in a hut. And that Washington paid rent for the accommodation. And that this arrangement was not occurring in the city of Philadelphia with the British occupation.
And we end the tour on the bluff overlooking the parade ground, standing beneath the large statue of Baron Friedrich von Steuben. And I tell the group that this is where America was born. “But” they always say, “what about Independence Hall?” “What about the Declaration of Independence”? And I explain….
The reading of the Declaration of Independence in July of 1776 in Philadelphia was exactly that – a declaration. An act of treason, yes. The eloquent and heartfelt expression of the intention to become a new nation. But not yet the birth of that nation. That would require dues to be paid and suffering to be met. And those dues and that suffering culminated here in Valley Forge. On this parade ground. Under the critical eye of Baron von Steuben. Who spoke no English but believed in the cause the soldiers were fighting for and believed in them as individuals and as a unified body of men. As what eventually became the army of the United States of America.
My involvement with Yan’an was not at all as direct as my involvement with Valley Forge. In fact, it was remarkably indirect. My work for several global manufacturing companies sent me to the Peoples Republic of China on a regular basis from 1994 to 2019. Almost every trip was limited to facilities in Shanghai. But finally, in 2019, I was able to make a journey north from Shanghai.
My research on Yan’an is embedded in the overall environment involving ‘The War of Japanese Aggression’. This is how World War 2 is referred to in China, although it’s essential to point out that The War of Japanese Aggression started long before America’s involvement in World War 2. China’s defense against the incursion by the Empire of Japan had been going on in earnest since 1937. And by and large, the ‘incursion’ was going far better than the ‘defense’.
China had evacuated the capital of Nanking, resulting in a Japanese occupation dominated by horrendous atrocities. The capital was moved to Wuhan (formerly Hankow) and then again to Chongqing when Japanese forces came into the area.
My research on Yan’an brought me first to Theodore H. White. Students of the science of politics will recognize Mr. White from his pivotal work, The Making of the President 1960. But before he became an observer of the American political scene, Teddy White was a US reporter based in Chongqing. And in early 1943 he seized an opportunity to visit Yan’an. This visit was documented in detail as part of White’s 1946 book Thunder Out of China.
As White outlines in Thunder Out of China, at the same time that Generalissimo Chiang Kai Shek was holding together a very loose coalition of Nationalist forces to fight the Japanese, he was also waging a constant campaign against the Chinese Communists. That campaign came to a head in October of 1934, when the Communist armies decided to separate into three distinct groups and make their way north to Shaanxi province. By 1944 the communists were well established in Shaanxi, only after surviving ‘The Long March’. Seeking an understanding of ‘how the other half lived’, White flew up to Yan’an. His description of his arrival there dramatically captures the essence of the experience:
“You come down on Yan’an from the air, over the roof of North China, after endless miles of topless loess hills whose weathered contours were graced by gentle yellow and brown fields. Within the vast monotony of these semiarid hills, whose arroyos and gulches ran crazily to the horizon, three canyons came together in a slender green flatland. From the air it had the look of a bandit’s lair, hidden in the inaccessible fastnesses of the hills, with a note of incongruity touched in by a T’ang pagoda perched atop a low peak, yellow and incredibly lovely against the blue sky. If you came to it by land through the blockade, two days by truck or five days by horse, the place seemed no different than hundreds of other county seats in northern China, except that it was much cleaner and its people moved with unaccustomed snap and vigor. Its sights were familiar – pack animals with red tassels over their heads, tufted camels from the desert, people padded in thick garments, the thick, choking loess dust of the northland. The atmosphere was different from Chongqing; it was dry a sparkling in summer, frigid but exhilarating in winter”.1
Long time China reporter John Roderick, also based in Chongqing, visited Yan’an after White and described the setting in similar terms:
“We made the two-and-a-half-hour flight in a U.S. Army transport plane, the same type in which I had overflown the Himalayas. The landscape could not have been more different. As we neared Yan’an the mountains gave way to enormous plateaus crisscrossed by deep fissures. A giant hand with immensely long fingernails seemed to have scratched deep into the brown earth. Then came the loess hills, created by windblown sands from the Gobi Desert over a period of thousands of years. Much later, I was reminded of the bleak landscape of the moon. Approaching the tiny Yan’an airfield, the plane threaded through deep valleys, its wing tips threatening to scrape the mountains on either side. We landed heavily, like a fighter plane hitting the deck of an aircraft carrier.
Yan’an had once been a walled city, an ancient county capital next to the Gobi Desert. In 1938 Japanese bombers leveled it, leaving the broken walls and a forlorn old tree to mark where it had once stood. As army of workers digging into the loess hills carved out a new city, one of 10,000 caves. The spectacle of this honeycomb of caves all around us made me gasp in astonishment. Thousands of humans lived and worked in these primitive habitations so reminiscent of man’s earlier shelters.
Both White and Roderick met with Mao and the rest of the CCP leadership while they were there in Yan’an. Both reporters were struck by the openness and authenticity of the group, in particular toward Western visitors. In fact, Chou En Lai, representing the CCP and sometimes stationed in Chongqing during periods when the two sides were attempting a rapprochement, met secretly with Ernest Hemingway and Martha Gellhorn during their trip to China in 1941. Roderick expressed his impression of the CCP leadership team in these terms:
“It somehow seemed absurd to hear these doll-like figures in their padded clothes, in such a remote and primitive part of the country, talking about the future of China. But when one reflected on the distance they had travelled, the hardships they had endured, and the courage they had shown in a thousand battles, it did not appear so strange. They spoke with the assurance and quiet authority of men who had commanded thousands and they apparently expected to be taken seriously”.2
From White’s perspective:
“These simple, earthy men did not look like any terrible threat to Chongqing or world stability. But when you examined their thinking and listened to their conversation, you found a stubborn, irreducible realism. The first thing you noticed was their knowledge of China. They knew their own country thoroughly and understood the villages. They were engineers of social relationships, and they knew precisely what the peasants’ grievances were and precisely how those grievances could be transmuted into action.3
White further offered this perspective on the role of Yan’an in the overall China communist campaign, including a conclusion that Yan’an was more of an encampment than a city:
“Yan’an was a confusing place. A substratum of 30,000 of its people were native to it; their forefathers had lived there time out of mind. They ate the same foods, spoke the same dialects, wore the same clothes, as all northern Chinese. But there was something more that did not belong to China at all; the people were ruddier, healthier, and the proportion of young to old was striking. There was bustle and excitement, pitched to the sound of shrill bugles echoing and rebounding from the hills at dawn in silver clarity. The confusion could be resolved only by deciding that Yan’an was not a political capital, nor a Chinese county seat, but a camp, a field headquarters, a provisional command post, ready to be struck and moved on the morrow”.4
The setting of Valley Forge National Historic Park can be described as pastoral, and perhaps idyllic. Especially in summer, the green rolling hills present gentle views that are reminiscent of a Monet landscape painting. A friend from college once described this type of terrain as ‘motherly’, and I believe that captures it perfectly. The park provides a mix of forest areas and fields, with the fields very much resembling pastures.
It’s likely the Valley Forge area looked as it presently does when the Continental Army arrived on December 19, 1777. However, soon after their arrival, the view of the area changed drastically. The fences bordering the plots of the local farmers were immediately consumed for firewood, and the large trees were chopped down to provide lumber for the 1,300 plus huts that were being constructed. In addition, the ground was carved up with fortifications, including trenches and redoubts, as well as numerous latrine and refuse pits. And the entire camp was crisscrossed with deeply rutted roads that developed to accommodate the carts and wagons supplying the army with food and equipment. At some point in the late spring the main camp became so unbearable that Washington ordered many of the regimental units to move across the Schuylkill River to fresh surroundings.
Visitors today can see ample evidence that the ensuing 246 years have been kind to Valley Forge. The environment has fully recovered and is protected by the National Historical Park status conferred on it in 1976.
The Yan’an area, along with the overall loess plateau environment, was during the encampment years a dry and inhospitable place. Visitors in the present day see a remarkably different scene. In 1999 the central government launched the ‘Grain for Green’ initiative, with Shaanxi province as one of the focus areas. The program’s aim was to alleviate the impact of flooding and soil erosion. The program succeeded remarkably well, and in May of 2019 the Yan’an area was formally taken off the list of impoverished jurisdictions, largely because of the improvements in agriculture and commerce stemming from Grain to Green. New arrivals to the city of Yan’an now see green hills and modern office buildings, rather than rocky cliffs and caves. Although the caves do survive at all the area historical sites.
Since I mentioned Hemingway earlier, let me say that on any summer weekend afternoon Valley Forge becomes a moveable feast. A true multi-purpose park, it attracts all kinds of people, locals as well as visitors from far away. Some are chasing history. These are often of an older demographic, and many arrive via tour bus. Locals visit either to picnic, enjoy the scenery or walk/run on the many trails, the main ones paved, but many others unpaved meandering through the woods and fields.
And over the years, on occasion, Valley Forge has received visitors of Presidential stature. In most recent memory, President Gerald Ford chose Valley Forge to deliver his initial remarks commemorating the Bicentennial of the United States on July 4th, 1976. A bit farther back in time, both President Truman and General Eisenhower addressed the scouts at the 1950 Boy Scout Jamboree. And Herbert Hoover spoke to a crowd of 20,000 on May 30, 1931 commemorating the 200th anniversary of the birth of George Washington.
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The Chinese Communist Party achieved victory over the Nationalist forces in October of 1949. At that time the CCP moved its entire infrastructure to Beijing, and Yan’an was left to return to its former position in Shaanxi prefectural life. When long time AP correspondent John Roderick returned to Yan’an after China opened up in 1981, he was struck by the lack of recognition of any aspect of the city’s pivotal role in 20th century Chinese history:
“There were no crowds of tourists, no merely curious people milling about what should have been a popular shrine celebrating communism’s finest days. It was as though Mao and his comrades had never existed.”5
In 2023 that lack of recognition has been completely reversed. Yan’an is one of several sites in China that have felt the effects of the wave of ‘Red Tourism’ that has become a trend for Chinese travelers since 2004, when the central government issued a plan to promote visits to historical sites in the country. On a spring weekend in Yan’an, the streets, historical sites and hotels are filled with families and tour groups systematically filing through each venue.
President Xi has visited Yan’an on several occasions. Despite being the first Chinese leader born after the 1949 victory over the Kuomintang, he regards himself as the ‘Keeper of the Revolution’ and is very cognizant of the Yan’an spirit. Xi lived in Yan’an for seven years, from 1969 to 1975. During that time, he resided in one of the cave dwellings and performed agricultural work that he regards as molding him for eventual CCP leadership. He returned for official state visits in February of 2015 and most recently last fall in late October 2022.
Growing up in upstate New York near Binghamton, on the state’s ‘Southern Tier’, history lessons in elementary school seemed to reflect Pennsylvania sites as much, or perhaps even more, than New York’s. Maybe because we were only a few miles from the PA border, my teachers placed great emphasis on two Pennsylvania sites in particular: Gettysburg and Valley Forge. And perhaps to leverage that foundation, my parents (as they all too often did) delivered me to those two historic locations.
For my young friends growing up in Shanghai or Zhengzhou, the Long March and the encampment of Yan’an were an integral part of their history lessons. China is said to have 5,000 years of history. But to my friends now living and working in Shanghai and Zhengzhou, for all intents and purposes, their China was born in 1949 with the Communist victory over the Nationalists. Of course, the family traditions, the food traditions, the holidays all stem from the full 5,000 years of culture and tradition. But in the realms of economics, politics, finance, transportation, industry and commerce, they live in a relatively new country, one that commemorated its 70th birthday back in 2019, during one of my visits.
When I visit Gettysburg or other historical sites where battles took place, numbers and exact facts seem to matter. “How many men were lost in Pickett’s Charge”? “When and where were the soldiers and cannon placed on Cemetery Ridge”? But when visiting an encampment like Valley Forge or Yan’an, the numbers and exact facts seem of less importance. What emerges instead is a recognition of the spirit of the place. Not so much what happened there, but why the place itself matters. Both Yan’an and Valley Forge are cultural touchstones for the citizens of their countries. And that makes the need for exact numbers fade in importance.
For Valley Forge and Yan’an, the exact facts gently yield to the legend. Although the myth says (and paintings show) Valley Forge with layers of heavy snow, the facts indicate it was a normal Southeast PA winter. Which means occasional snow but mostly cold and wet and miserable. And after now experiencing twenty-three of those winters, I can attest that Washington’s troops were quite sufficiently tested in their huts and on the parade ground.
And for the troops at Yan’an, did they cross eighteen mountain ranges and twenty-four rivers getting to Yan’an, or twenty-four mountain ranges and eighteen rivers? And did crossing the Chishui river four times count as four or one?
No, the facts don’t matter as much as the meaning of what took place in these two encampments - places that truly represent the birth of each of these modern nations. You wander among the sites, seeming to note the particular aspects of their history, but truly more interested in simply absorbing the overall atmosphere and ambience. You stroll the grounds, peak into the shelters and observe other visitors. You wonder, and try to guess, if any of those other visitors are also travelling back in time as you are. And if just maybe, they too believe they hear ‘the sound of shrill bugles echoing and rebounding from the hills at dawn in silver clarity’.
Phil Wetjen is an independent scholar, retired from a career in IT that allowed him to travel internationally to over twenty countries, including multiple visits/extended assignments in Japan, Germany, the UK and the People's Republic of China.