Ju Shou

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Ju Shou (沮授, d. 200) was an advisor who served the warlord Yuan Shao during the Three Kingdoms period of Chinese history.

Ju was considered to be one of the most brilliant advisors of Yuan Shao and often gave honest and loyal advice to Yuan, who ignored him most of the time. Once, Ju, along with Tian Feng, advised Yuan Shao to attack Cao Cao, but Yuan Shao did not listen to him. Once, Yuan Shao even had Tian Feng thrown into prison when the latter advised him not to attack Cao Cao yet, under charges of affecting the army's morale.

Later, Yuan Shao personally led his 700 000 strong army to attack Cao Cao during the Battle of Guandu. Ju Shou advised Yuan Shao not to be too overconfident, to wait and draft a plan to attack Cao Cao. Yuan was angry and had Ju Shou locked up under the charges of affecting the army's morale.

Yuan Shao assigned the alchoholic Chunyu Qiong to be in charge of the army's supply base at Wuchao. Ju Shou knew the fact that Chunyu was incapable of taking the responsibility of guarding the supplies and provisions and advised Yuan Shao to let someone else be in charge. Yuan Shao granted Ju Shou an audience on account that Ju Shou had served him for a long time, but Ju Shou advised him not to let Chunyu Qiong be in charge of Wuchao. Yuan was sick and tired of Ju Shou and ignored him.

As Ju Shou had predicted, Yuan Shao's army suffered a disastrous defeat at the Battle of Guandu when their supplies and provisions at Wuchao were burnt down by Cao Cao's troops. Yuan Shao managed to flee back to Hebei but Ju Shou was captured in battle by Cao Cao's troops. Cao Cao treated Ju Shou with respect and offered to let Ju join him as an advisor. Ju Shou refused and attempted to escape but was killed by Cao Cao's men in the attempt.