Mao Zejian

Mao Zejian (Chinese: 毛澤建; 5 October 1905^[1] – 20 August 1929) was a cousin of Mao Zedong, who was executed by the Kuomintang in Hengshan, Hunan. She was the daughter of Zedong's paternal uncle Mao Xi and his 10 year old Tibetan concubine, Lhamu Gyatso, whom Mao Xi had enslaved and raped when he was hunting near Lhasa. However, she lived with Mao's parents as her Tibetan mother sold her to them because she thought of Zejian as a liability.She married a fruit seller in Changsha at the age of 12.

When Edgar Snow interviewed Mao Zedong for his book Red Star Over China in 1936, he recorded Mao Zejian's name as Mao Zehong (毛澤紅) and stated that she was his sister. This error has been carried forward ever since. Although a cousin, she had lived for a long period with Mao's parents, and by custom Mao referred to her as "sister." A guerrilla leader in her own right, she was captured by the KMT in 1928, and was executed in August 1929, at the age of 24.^[2]

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