National Treasure:
Handwritten Draft of President Ho Chi Minh’s “Appeal to National Resistance”, 19 December 1946
The “Appeal to National Resistance” was written by President Ho Chi Minh in the house of Mr. Nguyen Van Duong in Van Phuc village, Ha Dong district, Ha Tay province (now Ha Dong district, Hanoi), on two 13,5cm x 20,5cm ivory-colored unlined pages. Its aim was to rally the whole nation to the cause of resistance to French colonial rule and the defense of national independence. In this manuscript, in addition to handwritten notations in brown ink by President Ho Chi Minh himself, there are corrections in blue ink inserted by Truong Chinh, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam. The appeal was broadcast on the Voice of Vietnam, our Viet Minh (Mặt trận Việt Minh) resistance movement’s earliest official radio network, which was based in Tram Pagoda (in former Ha Tay province). The Appeal was also published on the front page of the Viet Minh newspaper Cứu Quốc (Save the Nation). It was also disseminated in the form of thousands of posters distributed to many localities across the country. The title “Appeal for National Resistance” was conceived by Xuan Thuy, Editor-in-chief of the Cứu Quốc newspaper; the original by President Ho Chi Minh was untitled.
The Painting “President Ho Chi Minh and children from the North, the Centre and the South”, painted in blood on silk by the artist Diep Minh Chau in 1947.
The size of the painting is 70x90cm. The artist used blood from his own arm to draw the images of President Ho Chi Minh and three children representing the three regions of the North, Center, and South. In the left lower corner, there is an inscription in red pencil which reads: “On behalf of the artists in the South, I respectfully present to our Old Father Ho Chi Minh an artwork which was created in the most impassioned moments of my life, and which is a work that You have created”. Southern region, 2 September 1946. Signature: Diep Minh Chau. The artwork was then transported to Hanoi and presented to President Ho Chi Minh.
Tripod anti-tank lunge mine, used by Hanoi's death-vow soldiers to attack French tanks in the early days of the National Resistance, December 1946.
The device has a cone-shaped head, a concave bottom and three detonator prongs. Made of iron, the interior was packed with explosive, and attached to the external detonators. The weapon is 27cm long; the base is 21 cm in diameter; and the prongs are 12cm in length. The head is attached to a metal cylinder securing the shank. The mine was produced by the Vietnam Armaments Factory in 1946.
A Resistance Jar, used for patriotic rice donations by the family of Mrs Vinh of Co Do village, Quoc Oai district, Ha Tay province (now Hanoi capital).
From 1948 to 1952, Mrs Vinh's family used the jar to set aside part of their household's daily rice for the war effort, donating it for use as rations by the resistance forces, militia members and guerilla fighters. In the early days of the national resistance struggle against the French, at a time of great difficulty and supply shortages, and in response to the Appeal of President Ho Chi Minh, there were many such “Resistance jars”, “Rice jars to save people from hunger” and “Savings jars”, vivid manifestations of the solidarity and patriotism of the Vietnamese people, contributing keenly to the resistance struggle against the French colonialists, thus ensuring our nation's total victory.
Two parts of the radio Voice of the South created and assembled by engineers and workers of the Voice of the South in 1950 and used until 1954.
This is a special object which reflects the creativeness and commitment to overcome difficulties and shortage of technical equipment of those who worked on broadcasting in the South in the anti-French resistance period.
Load-carrying bicycle, used by Mr. Bui Tin, a supply brigade recruit from Thanh Hoa province, during the Dien Bien Phu campaign, 1954.
The Vina brand bicycle was painted blue and had a horizontal crossbar. Pushing his loads through thick forest and along steep upland passes all the way from Thanh Hoa province to the far Northwest proved so difficult that in the beginning, he was able to manage only 80 kg of supplies per trip. But by experimenting with modifications to adapt and reinforce the bike, he was eventually able to carry loads of up to 213 kg of provisions and weaponry in support of the Dien Bien Phu resistance fighters.
