The old residence of Zhou Enlai is located
on the border of Quxiang Lane
and Western Hongguang Lane in
Huai'an City, Jiangshu
Province.
Zhou (1898-1976), whose ancestral home is in
Shaoxing of Zhejiang Province, was an important founder of the New China. He
once acted as premier and foreign minister of the People's Republic of China,
vice-president of China People's Revolutionary Military Commission, president of
the National Committee of China People's Political Consultative Conference and
vice-president of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of
China.
The two compounds of the old residence were
bought by Zhou's grandfather and his uncle respectively when they both moved to
Huai'an from their ancestral home in Zhejiang. Originally, the residence had 31
rooms with three rows of 12 houses in the eastern compound and three rows of 19
houses in the western compound. Zhou was born in the third room from the west in
the northern part of the western compound on March 5, 1898 and spent his
childhood and early youth there. The two rooms from the east in the northern
part of the western compound served as Zhou's study rooms. In 1910, 12-year-old
Zhou left Huai'an for Northeastern China to study.