At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the power of the imperial court declined, and local forces rose. In order to compete for territory, local warlords have been fighting among themselves for many years, during which many well-known famous generals have emerged.
However, because of the years of fighting on the battlefield, most of these generals did not get a good death, and some were even almost wiped out.
Ma Chao was one of the most famous fierce generals in the Three Kingdoms, and his ancestor was Ma Yuan, the founding hero of the Eastern Han Dynasty, who guarded Xiliang for generations.
In the early years, Cao Cao fought yuan shao for power, and Ma Chao's father Ma Teng once helped Cao Cao fight against Yuan Shao. After Cao Cao annexed Yuan Shao, in order to commend Ma Teng's merits, and more importantly, to contain the Western Liang army led by Ma Chao, he summoned Ma Teng to the dynasty and was made a wei lieutenant.
In the sixteenth year of Jian'an (211), Cao Cao sent Xiahou Yuan to lead an army, intending to attack Hanzhong through Western Liang. However, Ma Chao thought that Cao Cao said that he was borrowing the road, but in fact he wanted to take the opportunity to annex Liangzhou, so he refused Cao Cao's request, and at the same time united the forces in Guanzhong to unite against Cao Cao.
Xiahou Yuan reported the incident to Cao Cao, who knew that Xi liang's army was brave and good at war, so he asked the vanguard troops not to act rashly and wait for reinforcements. Shortly thereafter, Cao Cao personally led a large army to the battlefield.
Not long after the arrival of the large army, it engaged the Western Liang coalition army led by Ma Chao. At the beginning of the battle, Ma Chao showed his might, and Cao Cao's army was defeated in a battle, if it were not for Xu Zhu's personal protection, even Cao Cao would almost be captured by the Western Liang army.
Cao Cao saw Ma Chao's bravery and knew that he could not be a strong opponent, so he had a divisive plan to provoke the relationship between Ma Chao and Han Sui. Ma Chao did indeed begin to suspect that Han Sui was colluding with Cao Cao, and at this moment, Cao Cao sent five thousand elite cavalry into battle. The Western Liang army was suspicious of each other, and Cao Cao's cavalry was very brave, so in this battle, Ma Chao was defeated.
After Cao Cao defeated Ma Chao, he took revenge by beheading Ma Chao's father, Ma Teng, ma Chao's two brothers, and other family members.
The news of his family's murder soon reached Ma Chao's ears, making him even more determined to resist Cao Cao. Ma Chao united with the generals stationed in the Longshang area, and Zhang Lu in Hanzhong also sent troops to help, but the defenders of Jicheng refused to respond to Ma Chao.
Therefore, Ma Chao led more than 10,000 people gathered and began to attack Jicheng. However, Jicheng was strong and difficult to capture in a short period of time, so Ma Chao led his troops to surround Jicheng and cut off its supply of grain and grass, and has been besieging it for more than half a year. Jicheng lost its supply of grain and grass and could not be stationed, so it sent people outside to ask for help. As a result, as soon as he left the city, the people who asked for help were killed by Ma Chao's army. The defenders of Jicheng saw that they could not go outside for help, and when they were cornered, they had no choice but to surrender.
After Ma Chao entered the city, he killed all the Taishou and Assassin shi of Jicheng. Many of the defenders of Jicheng originally did not want to join Ma Chao, which caused the dissatisfaction of the generals of Jicheng, but out of fear, no one dared to say anything. However, one of them, Yang Fu, was determined to avenge Taishou and Shi Shi. He had a cousin named Jiang Xu, who was stationed in Licheng. He secretly contacted Jiang Xu and some other people who were dissatisfied with Ma Chao and prepared to rebel against Ma Chao together.
This matter was soon known to Ma Chao, so Ma Chao led his troops to attack Licheng. However, when he attacked Licheng, the defenders of Jicheng took the opportunity to control Jicheng and arrested Ma Chao's family and killed them.
When Ma Chao learned of this, he immediately rushed back to Jicheng, Yang Fu led the generals of Jicheng to engage Ma Chao, Yang Fu was stabbed five times by Ma Chao, and seven people were killed, but Ma Chao failed to retake Jicheng, and finally led his troops to Zhang Lu.
At this time, Ma Chao was not only a general of the defeated army, but also a loner, his parents and brothers were killed by Cao Cao, and his wife and children were killed by Yang Fu, even in the eyes of outsiders, they felt very miserable. But Ma Chao was not willing to give up, he borrowed troops from Zhang Lu to attack Xiliang, wanting to avenge his family, but in the end he did not return.
However, Ma Chao's bravery and good fighting caused The jealousy of Zhang Lu's subordinate Yang Bai and wanted to harm Ma Chao, and Ma Chao was alert in time and led his cronies to flee to The Middle.
At this time, when Liu Bei attacked Xichuan and learned that Ma Chao had fled abroad, he immediately sent Li Hui to lobby. Ma Chao was already cornered, and now that someone was willing to take him in, he naturally couldn't ask for it, so he turned to Liu Bei and established a lot of merit in the subsequent attack on Xichuan.
After laying siege to Xichuan, Ma Chao re-established a room, gave birth to a son, and finally had his own family. But his parents, wife and children were killed, and Ma Chao could not let go.
In the second year of Shu Han Zhangwu (222), Ma was overweight and ill, and he wrote to Liu Bei: "More than 200 people in my clan were all killed by Cao Cao, and now there is only one cousin Ma Dai and a young son, and I hope that Your Majesty will take more care of them." Not long after that, Ma Chao died at the age of forty-seven.