Feng Yuxiang - Later Years

Later Years

Between 1935 and 1945, Feng Yuxiang supported the KMT and held various positions in the Nationalist army and government. In October 1935, Chiang invited him to Nanjing to serve as the vice-president of the National Military Council. He held the nominal position until 1938 and remained a member of the Council until 1945. During the Xian Incident, when Chiang Kai-Shek was held prisoner by rebellious warlords, he immediately called for Chiang's release. After the Second Sino-Japanese War began in 1937 he was Commander in Chief of the 6th War Area.

After World War II, he traveled to the United States where he was an outspoken critic of the Chiang regime and of Truman administration’s support for it. While there he came to General Stilwell's house in California, as he admired Stilwell. Barbara Tuchman tells the story (Stilwell and the American Experience in China 1911-1945, pp. 82–3): "a few days after her husband's death, Mrs. Stilwell was upstairs at her home in Carmel when a visitor was announced with some confusion as 'the Christian.' Mystified, she went down to find in the hall the huge figure and cannonball head of Feng Yu-hsiang, who said, 'I have come to mourn with you for Shih Ti-wei, my friend.'"

Although he was never a Communist, he was close to them in his final years.

According to descendants whose father was raised as a young boy by Feng Yu-hsiang in his household, and was inspired by the elder Feng's example of service to country and countrymen to join and serve in the military, Feng Yu-hsiang also visited and lived for several months in Berkeley, California during his stay as visiting scholar.

He died in a shipboard fire on the Black Sea while en route to the Soviet Union in 1948, along with one of his daughters. Some believe he was murdered; others deny it.

The same descendants also learned from their father that many believed Feng was murdered by political adversary/ies; and that those who knew details of the shipboard fire and its circumstances had reported that Feng and his daughter perished in the middle of night behind their cabin door(s) that had been locked from the outside.

The Chinese Communists classified Feng as a 'good warlord,' and his remains were buried with honors in 1953, at the sacred mountain T'ai Shan in Shandong. His tomb is located immediately to the east of Tianwai Village square (36°12′25.86″N 117°6′7.95″E / 36.2071833°N 117.1022083°E / 36.2071833; 117.1022083). His widow Lu Te-chiuan was Minister of Public Health of the People's Republic of China.