86,000 men and woman began the trip that would last over a year until October 19, 1935 in Yan'an in Sha'anxi Province. Some of the prominent Chinese leaders that began the Long March were Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai, Deng Xiaoping, Zhu De, Peng Dehuai, leading the Third Army Group, Lin Biao, leading the First Army Group, Nie Rongzhen, political commissar of the First Front Army, Liu Bocheng, Ye Jianying, (the preceding from Zhu to Ye would later be declared Marshals in 1955), and Li Xiannian, who would become the President of the People's Republic of China. He Long, (also to be named a Marshal) had been sent ahead leading the Second Army Group and to-be-Marshal Chen Yi was left behind with the wounded and sick.