During the Hui Minorities' War in the 1860s Hezhou Prefecture was a scene of fierce fighting between the Muslim (Hui, Dongxiang, and Salar, in modern terms) rebels on one side and the Han Chinese militias and, later, government troops, on the other side. From 1862 to 1872, Hezhou City (today's Linxia City) was the stronghold of the Muslim (mostly Hui) rebels led by the Khufiyya imam Ma Zhan'ao and his associates Ma Haiyan and Ma Qianling. After the Qing general Zuo Zongtang had finally destroyed the rebels farther east, in Shaanxi and Ningxia, he tried to take Hezhou in the late 1872, but his troops were badly defeated by Ma Zhan'ao's Muslim fighters at the battle of Taizi Mosque. Ma Zhan'ao, however, realized that he could not hold against the Qing armies forever, and made a deal with Zuo Zongtang: he surrendered Hezhou to the government forces, executed those locals who objected to the surrender.