First Battle
After Xihuachi Campaign, the nationalists adjusted their deployment and the nationalist Reorganized 82nd Division of Ma clique was tasked to encircle the communist base in the Meridian Ridge with other nationalist units commanded by Hu Zongnan. The Reorganized 100th Brigade of the nationalist Reorganized 82nd Division was stationed at Ning (宁) County, the Reorganized 8th Cavalry Brigade of the nationalist Reorganized 82nd Division stationed at Qingyang, and the brigade-strength Independent 5th Cavalry Regiment (later to be expanded into the 248th Division) of the nationalist Reorganized 82nd Division stationed at Zhengning (正宁). General Ma Jiyuan (马继援)’s plan would require the entire division to complete, but the bad weather had prevented the nationalists from taking full advantage of their cavalry. The heavy rain severely slowed down the marching of the nationalist formation, and it took an entire day to for the nationalist force to reach its designated position.
On August 14, 1947, the heavy rain in eastern Gansu had finally stopped. The nationalist advanced guard consisted of the nationalist Independent 5th Cavalry Regiment and the 2nd Regiment of the nationalist Reorganized 100th Brigade made contact with the enemy at regions of Golden Village Temple (Jin Cun Miao, 金村庙) and Dou Family’s Ridge (Dou Jia Liang 豆家梁) near Nine Steep Hills (Jiu Xian 九岘) Town. The communist local garrison Gao Xuewen (高学文) Independent Regiment fought a delay action while gradually retreating eastward, finally disengaged the enemy, but the nationalists were not able to resume their rapid push by taking advantage of the good weather as they had hoped, because they were further blocked by another communist guerrilla force, the Northern Wei (Weibei 渭北) Column at Fu Family’s Village (Fu Jia Zhuang, 付家庄). Although the nationalists managed to driven the enemy from their positions and severely wounding the communist guerrilla commander Yao Pengfei (姚鹏飞), the blocking actions fought by these communist units had provided the much needed times for the communists to evacuate and redeploy.
Read more about this topic: Meridian Ridge Campaign
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