Chess History And Reminiscences
held at the St. George's Chess Club Rooms in Cavendish Square,
London, in 1851. Staunton maintained his title to the British
Championship until this great International event took place which
was signalized by the decisive victory of Prof. Anderssen, of
Breslau. Staunton made no real effort to recover his laurels
afterwards or to in any way reassert English claims to supremacy.
The foreign players, after the Tournament, Szen, Lowenthal,
Kiezeritzky, Mayet, Jaenisch, Harrwitz and Horwitz frequented
Simpson's and Anderssen (like Morphy seven years later) greatly
favoured the place, and readily engaged in skirmishes of the more
lively enterprising, and brilliant description in which he ever
met a willing opponent in Bird, who, though a comparatively young
player, to the surprise and gratification of all spectators, made
even games. This young player who it seems had acquired his utmost
form at this time, also won the two only even games he ever played
with Staunton, and also two from Szen, which occasioned yet more
astonishment, the last-named having been regarded by many
deemed good judges, the best player in the world before the
Tournament was held, and even in higher estimation than his
fellow countryman Lowenthal, and considered not inferior to
Staunton himself. Judging from the success of this the youngest
player who was certainly not superior if equal to Buckle or Boden,
it is not unreasonable to conclude that Staunton with his greater
experience and skill, had he possessed the same temperament as
Bird, and at the slow time limit which suited him as well as it
has Steinitz (his exact counterpart in force and style) would
have regained his ascendancy for Great Britain. It is undoubtedly
owing to the opportunities at Simpson's that Boden and Bird so
rapidly acquired first rank and the partial withdrawal of the
former, and the entire relinquishment of chess by the latter from
1852 to 1858 was unfortunate for English chess renown, for on
the appearance of the phenomenon, Paul Morphy, and Staunton's
default in meeting him, there was no English player in practise
able to do honor to Morphy over the board, except a new comer,
Barnes; and Boden and Bird, but acquiesced in a general wish,
(albeit an equal pleasure to themselves) in revisiting Simpson's to
play with the subsequently found to be invincible Morphy.
Simpson's Divan was naturally the first resort of the
incomparable Paul Morphy, and he greatly preferred it to any other
chess room he ever saw, he even went so far as to say it was
"very nice," which was a great deal from him, the most
undemonstrative young man we ever met with. Certainly nothing else in
London, from St. Paul's, Westminster Abbey and the Tower to
our Picture Galleries and Crystal Palace, not even the Duke of
Wellington's Equestrian Statue, elicited such praise from him as
"very nice," at least as applied to any inanimate object.
Louis Paulsen arriving from America in 1861, at once visited
the Divan and played twelve games blindfold simultaneously
there against a very powerful team amid much enthusiasm, it
being the earliest exhibition among us on so large a scale. Morphy
had in 1858 played eight games blindfold both in Birmingham
and Paris. This was 63 years after Philidor's exhibition of two
games blindfold (and one over the board) a performance then
thought marvellous, and which it was predicted would not be
believed or attempted in any future generation. However we read
of A. McDonnell playing without seeing the board and men in
1830. Bilguer in like manner did so sometime before his death
in 1841. La Bourdonnais in 1842, and Harrwitz at Hull in 1847,
but neither more than two games. Paulsen in the West of America
1855-6-7, was the first to accomplish ten or twelve games blindfold,
which he did with very marked success. Steinitz from Prague,
who for twenty-two years, from 1867 to 1889, has been regarded
as chess champion of the world, at the usual slow time limit is
now residing in Brooklyn, New York. Soon after his arrival from
Vienna in 1862 he became a tolerably regular attendant at
Simpson's, and it was through this that his appointment of Chess
Editor to the "Field" arose, as well as that of Mr. Hoffer who
superseded him in that post. Mr. Walsh, chief Editor of the
"Field," had been for many years a constant visitor at Simpson's,
and the column for a long time was not favourable to our chess
interests. Foreign influence and views became far too
conspicuously manifested. The great English chess players were of a
retiring nature after the disappearance of the powerful Staunton
and Captain Kennedy, and the retirement of the genial
McDonnell; Boden was as reserved as Buckle or as Morphy, Bird
cared only for his game. Such eggs of chess patronage as
continued to exist, somehow or other always found their way into
one and the same basket, to which no British master could have
access. No eminent English player had any voice in chess
management, and though the Jubilee year's proceedings, bid fair
to balance matters on a more cosmopolitan basis, the facts
remain that for the three last German Tournaments at Frankfort,
Breslau and Dresden, neither Lee nor Pollock, the youngest, nor
Bird, the oldest master, could on either occasion manage to
participate.
Small, but very enjoyable first class Tournaments have been
held at Simpson's, which have always evoked a considerable degree
of enthusiasm, and at times stimulated energy in the constituted
authorities, and been productive of Tournaments on a larger scale
elsewhere.
Notwithstanding that the Mammoth laws of Limited Liability
in 1867, absorbed the gorgeous and spacious Divan Saloon, for the
present ladies dining room, and somewhat lessened the chess
accommodation, the distinguishing characteristics of the place
have remained unchanged, while the glorious chess events and
reminiscences continue nearly as vividly fixed in the recollection
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