Suzhou guan yu statue9/26/2023 Becoming a godĪfter his death, Guan Yu became a legend and eventually a god. Eventually, his remaining force was trapped and Guan Yu and his son Guan Ping were captured and executed. Still Guan refused offers to surrender, at one point pretending to surrender to Sun Quan’s troops before running away. This led to desertions, shrinking Guan’s forces even further. “All knew that their families had come to no harm and were even treated better than in peacetime so Yu’s soldiers became less interested in fighting,” wrote Ssu-ma Kuang. Lu Meng treated them very well and made sure that Guan’s army knew it. Lu Meng, Sun Quan’s general, made Guan’s situation worse by capturing the city of Jiangling, which housed the families of many of Guan’s officers. Guan suddenly found himself commanding a weakened force trapped between two enemy armies, those of Cao Cao and Sun Quan. A counter-attack by Cao Cao’s forces forced Guan to break it off. While his rearguard positions were under attack, Guan’s siege of Fancheng faltered. Meanwhile, Lu attacked Guan’s weak rearguard positions, taking them out before a message could be sent to Guan. Guan thought the letter was fake and kept up his siege. Sun also sent a letter to Cao Cao offering to launch a joint attack against Guan.Ĭao Cao decided to publish Sun Quan’s letter, hoping that Guan would abandon the siege of Fancheng to fight Sun (Cao Cao wanted to have his enemies fight against each other). This led Guan to withdraw troops from his rear guard to support the siege. He replaced the local general, Lu Meng, with a man whom Guan thought would pose no threat. Ssu-ma Kuang wrote that Guan aggravated the situation by seizing Sun Quan’s food stores without permission to support the siege of Fancheng. He already holds (Jing) province and he governs with great favor and loyalty,” Meng said according to the historian. “Yu is brave and fierce, so it is difficult to match him. The Chinese historian Ssu-ma Kuang writes that Sun’s general Lu Meng started plotting against him. Laying siege, he was concerned that the forces of Sun Quan would betray and attack him (the alliance between Liu Bei and Sun had grown cold since the Battle of Red Cliffs). 219, Guan led an army of Liu Bei’s in attacking Fancheng, a city held by Cao Cao. The "Three Brothers" - Liu Bei (swords), Guan Yu (halberd) and Zhang Fei (spear) - fight Fancheng in a print from a Qing Dynasty edition of Luo Guanzhong's "Romance of the Three Kingdoms." (Image credit: Public domain.) The final campaignĪround A.D. “I’m better than that dunderhead!” Guan is said to have thundered when he heard that he would have the same rank as Huang (eventually Guan agreed to accept the arrangement). The battle was a disaster for Cao Cao and he suffered a defeat that allowed the three kingdoms to come into existence.Īs Liu Bei consolidated his position, becoming the King of Shu, Guan was promoted to the position of “General of the Van,” something that he was unhappy about because he had the same rank as a man named Huang Chung whom he disliked. During this battle, Cao Cao’s army, pressing south, tried to re-unify China by destroying the forces of Liu Bei and Sun Quan, who had formed an alliance. 208, after the death of general Liu Biao, he took command of a fleet of ships on the Han River and brought them to Red Cliffs. Records indicate that he excelled at naval warfare. Over the next two decades Guan, would work with Liu Bei in a series of military campaigns that would eventually lead to the foundation of the Kingdom of Shu. Cao Cao was said to have been so impressed by his loyalty and martial prowess that he ordered his troops to let Guan go. He cut off Liang’s head and came back and no one in Shao’s army could resist him,” wrote Ssu-ma Kuang.Īfter the battle, he fled Cao Cao’s army to rejoin Liu Bei. He whipped his horse and broke through to Liang among ten thousand men of his army. “Yu saw Liang’s standard in the distance. To repay Cao Cao for the good way he had treated him Guan decided to kill a general named Yan Liang, who served a man named Yuan Shao (a rival of Cao Cao). In the end I must go.” (Translation by Rafe de Crespigny, published in 1969) “I know well how generously Lord (Cao Cao) has treated me, but I have received favors from General (Liu Bei) and I swore to die with him. Still, Guan regarded Liu Bei and Zhang Fei as brothers and he would not abandon them.Īccording to the 11th-century Chinese historian Ssu-ma Kuang, Guan decided that he had to escape and rejoin Liu, but not before doing Cao Cao a favor first. Cao Cao treated Guan well and made him a lieutenant general in his own army.
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