Pawn to King: The Rise of Howard Staunton

Hello everyone! Today, I'm excited to dive into the life of Howard Staunton, one of the greatest chess masters of the 19th century. He was a true icon, and his remarkable legacy deserves more recognition. Let's get started!

Early Life

Howard Staunton was born in April 1810, in London. He was the son of Frederick Howard. He was neglected in youth, getting small amounts of Education, although he spent some time in Oxford, he was never a member of the university. 

Late 1830s and 1840s

Howard Staunton played a lot of games in 1838 against William Davies Evans, the creator of the Evans Gambit. He also played a match against German chess player and writer, Aaron Alexandre, but ultimately lost. He improved a lot in 1840, allowing him to win a tough game against the seasoned German master, H.W Popert, who was known for his slow, cautious strategy with great defensive skills. From May to December 1840 Howard Staunton edited a chess column in the New Court Gazette. He also became a chess editor for the British Miscellany Magazine. His chess column eventully developed into it's own magazine, the Chess Player's Chronicle, which he owned and edited until the early 1850s. 

Early in 1843 Staunton prevailed in a long series of games against John Cochrane. Later that year he lost a short match 2.5-3.5 to Pierre Charles Fournier de Saint-Amant. After losing such a devastating match, Staunton needed revenge. He challenged Pierre Charles Fournier de Saint-Amant to another, longer match to be played in Paris. The prize for the victorious player was a whopping £100, which is over £12000 in 2025. 

Staunton then prepared new opening lines for the match, especially those beginning with 1.c4, which then became called the English Opening after this match. This is the first known case where seconds were used in a chess match. The day of the match came, and Staunton won 13-8 (eleven wins, four draws, and six losses), even though he earlier had a seven-game lead. 

Pierre Charles Fournier de Saint-Amant wanted a third match, but Staunton initially declined as he had developed heart palpitations during the second match. He eventually wanted to start the third match in October 1844, but he had caught pneumonia while travelling and almost died. The match was postponed and actually never had a chance to happen. I wonder how it would of gone down! 

In 1845 Staunton began a chess column for the The Illustrated London News. It later became the most influential chess column in the world! In 1847 Staunton published his most famous work, The Chess-Player's Handbook. 

It contained over 300 pages of opening analysis, and almost 100 pages of endgame analysis. 

He still found time to play (and beat) two professionals: Bernhard Horwitz and Daniel Harrwitz. The match against Harrwitz was set up in a very weird way: seven games in which Staunton gave Harrwitz pawn odds and two moves. 

On 23 July 1849, Staunton married Frances Carpenter Nethersole, who had had eight children by a previous marriage. 

In 1849, Nathaniel Cooke made the famous Staunton Chess Set, and ever since it was created, it has been one of the most used chess sets of all time, bonding beginners and masters alike. In fact, Anthony Saidy and Norman Lessing claimed that "If a vote was taken among chess-players as to which pieces they most enjoyed playing with, the Staunton chessmen would win by an overwhelming margin." 

The Staunton Chess Set.

1851 London 

Staunton hosted the 1851 London Chess Tournament. It was a huge milestone, as it was the first ever international chess tournament. £500 was the prize, which is huge money now in 2025! 

This tournament held some of the greatest games of all time, such as the Immortal Game. 

The tournament had 16 experts:

1850s + Later Life

Paul Morphy

Conclusion

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Thank you all for reading this, and I hope you learned a lot. Howard Staunton was clearly not just a usual chess player- he was an inspiration for generations of chess players to come. And now we can agree that we all appreciate it, right?