The Long March

In 1933, when she was 19, Chang joined the communist party. By 1933, Shang Kai-shek gathered an army of 700,000 men and surrounded the communist Red Army led by Mao Zedong. This led to a 6,000 mile journey retreat by communist forces known as the Long March. Meanwhile, the Japanese had taken full control of Manchuria in northeast China. It set the stage for a future invasion that were up in Chang's life and set her on a trajectory to shape Chinese history.