Chess legends series: McDonell and La Bourdonnais

After Philidor's death in 1795, Europe was struggling to find an equally strong chess player. In the first half of 19th century two players were prepared to take the chess world for themselves : Louis Charles de Labourdonnais (1795-1840) and Alexander Mac Donell (1798-1835).

Louis Charles de Labourdonnais

Labourdonnais came from a known rich family but he quickly lost his wealth and his new source of income was the game of chess.At that time playing chess wasn't a lucrative job to have, even for the very best players of the game. He studied through the entire Philidor's "Analysis", however his style of play was nowhere near the style of Philidor's .In 1833 he published a book called " A New Treatise on Chess" where for the first time in history were discussed topics such as : how to calculate variations?,how to read a chess book properly etc. He also was the founder of the first chess monthly magazine "Le Palamède".In 1824 Labourdonnais conquered England for 10 years still awaiting anyone worthy facing him.After a 10 year wait, England finally had a proper challenger: Alexander Mac Donell.

Alexander Mac Donell

Mac Donell was born in Belfast in 1798 . As a trained merchant and former worker in West Indies, he settled In 1820 in London.His job as a secretary in Committee of West Indian Merchants gave him plenty of money to get better at the game he loved: chess.He was a highly tactical player that didn't waste any time in the opening which is perfectly shown in his nowadays fully solved gambit variation in King's gambit accepted.

In 1834 a chess theoretician, historian, writer and founder of Westminster chess club, George Walker, organised a tournament that can be considered an unofficial world chess championship.The clash between Labourdonnais and Mac Donnell ended up in favour of Labourdonnais. The final score from 85 match tourmanent was pretty straightforward : 45 wins, 27 losses and 13 draws in favour of the winner.Even though these two players played many games together, one of those games became immortal and its undeniable beauty is observed by chess players all around the world even today.If Philidor was alive at the time, he would smile because his beloved pawns were now truly as he called: " a soul of a game".

Labourdonnais and his style of playing consisted of strong solid opening play combined with highly tactical style.The deadly combination that was exploited to perfection by another chess legend Paul Morphy. Both of these players died before another two great players from England and France: Howard Staunton (1810-1874) and Pierre Charles de Saint Amant(1800-1872) continued the clash between the two nations, which will be the topic of discussion next time.