After the outbreak of the May Thirtieth Movement, the Canton–Hong Kong strike took place, in which Chinese protestors called for a boycott of British Hong Kong and a general strike against the British colonial authorities. Around 250,000 Chinese people left the colony for Guangdong, causing the paralysis of Hong Kong's economy. During the strike, Zhang Renjie succeeded the recently deceased Sun Yat-sen as Chairman of the Kuomintang, bringing a distinctly anarchist leadership to the party alongside Li Shizeng, Wu Zhihui and Cai Yuanpei. However, Chiang Kai-shek began to rise to power within the Kuomintang and deposed the "Four Elders", marking a shift to the right-wing inside the party. Chiang initiated the Shanghai massacre, during which thousands of leftists were killed, beginning the Chinese Civil War.