A Study of 19th Century Chess

Early in the last quarter of the 15th century, several rules of movement and play were intiated and recorded  [keeping in mind  Murray's caveat that "the reform was historically only the culmination of a long series of experiments with the moves of the  pieces, carried out during the medieval period."],  changing a slow moving, stagnant game into a vibrant and exciting  competition. So popular were these changes that even in those days of ponderous travel and sluggish communication, they  swarmed across Europe with such speed that by the time that by the time the calendar read 1500, the old form of chess  was played hardly anywhere.  With these changes came a new and unfamiliar way to approach the game. So foreign were  the concepts that Modern or Reformed Chess was almost virgin soil, fertile to new ideas and ripe for experimention. Murray  called this age, which streched from Lucena in the late 1400s to Greco in the first half of the 16th century, "the first creative  period in the history of modern chess."

There were several chess writers of note during this time: Francesch Vicent, Lucena, Pedro Damiano, Ruy Lopez, Orazio  Gianutio del Mantia, Giulio Cesare Polerio, Dr. Alessandro Salvio, Pietro Carrera and, of course, Gioachino Greco himself.
Greco's manuscripts, published posthumously by Henry Herringman, translated by Francis Beale and engraved by Peter  Stent under the title "The Royall Game of Chess-Play" in 1656,  remained the chess-players' bible for nearly a century.  Copies of Greco's games were call Calabrians, after Greco's sobriquet, Il Calabrese.

The 18th century rolled in with very few notably original ideas.  In Italy the Modense players, Lolli, del Rio and Ponziani wrote  their books extolling the open game, particlarly the Italian Game.  Carlo Francesco Cozio, also of Italy, published a book of  openings and one on endings and middlegame studies. He also followed Greco's tactics-based ideas.  Philip Stamma  from Syria published a book in Holland but it was backward-facing rather than innovative.  But then François-André  Danican Philidor  published his well-received, if not so well understood, treatise, "Analyse du jeu des Échecs."  One thing that Philidor accomplished was to lay the foundation for opposing schools of chess which would begin to mature after his death near the turn of the century.

As the 19th century began, chess seemed to be particularly embraced in Great Britain, France, Germany, the United States  and Russia. Other countries did embace the game but their documentation seems far less.  Paris had attracted the best  players prior to the turn of the century. Philidor, who traveled between Paris and London seasonally, played at the famous Café de la Régence, as did other strong players such as Verdoni, Leger, Carlier and Bernard who together published  "Traité Théorique et Pratique du jeu des Echecs par une Societé d' Amateurs."  Philidor had been the strongest player in  London also and upon his death Verdoni moved to London and, altough not Philidor's equal, presided at the Parsloe's Coffee House in Philidor's place. 

In Russia, chess  wasn't documented this early. It would be 2 decades before I. A. Butrimov would publish Russia's first chess book (using  algebraic notation).  In the United States, even though Ben Franklin had been overly fond of the game and the current  president, John Adams was a chess-player, as was his vice-president Thomas Jefferson, chess had yet to produce  anything resembling a culture. Germany, a country that had a long love affair with chess, was really producing little of note  around 1800.

The 19th century started out rather austere. 

As the curtain opens, it reveals a serene stage awaiting the performers, the legendary figures waiting in the wings as well as the crucial supporting players patiently awaiting their cues.

In London in the 1790s, Philidor's main protagonists at Parsloe's were George Atwood and Joseph Wilson. Both these learned men were instrumental in preserving games of Philidor without which we would be left with very few.  While Wilson  reintroduced the Muzio Gambit, which had been forgotten, and lived until 1833, Atwood, who died in 1807, seemed the better player of the two.  Verdoni himself had died in 1804. 
The figure that rose to the top and stands out among the rest would have to be Verdoni's student, Jacob Henry Sarratt, who upon Verdoni's death became the house professional at Salopian at Charing Cross. Claiming the title of "Professor of Chess." he taught chess at the price of a guinea per game. Unlike the students of Philidor, Sarratt was a follower of the Modenese school in the syle of Greco. In fact, Sarratt had a notion that chess culminated in the 16th century and that everything since then had been a step backwards. Sarratt published his "Treatise on the Game of Chess" in 1808 (considered by many the first worthwhile book of the 19th century) and translated works of antiquity though very poorly.  Sarratt's translation of Damiano, Lopez, and Salvio and that of Gianutio and Selenus, as Willard Fiske put it are "so mutilated as to be of little value,"  and such that Geo. Walker call  them his "his barbarously mutilated translations."  Sarratt has been described as tall, lean and muscular and had even been a prize-fighter at one point. He had also breeded dogs for fighting. He was regarded as a very affable fellow and very well-read but with limited taste.  He was also capable of playing chess blindfold.  One of Sarratt's legacies is that he mentored Willaim Lewis of whom we'll see much later on.  Sarratt died in 1819 after a protracted illness during which he couldn't work, leaving his wife destitute. In 1821 a posthumous edition of his Treatise, "A New Treatise on the Game of Chess," was published (by his student, William Lewis). This copy covered the game of chess as a whole and was designed for the novice player. It also contained a 98 page analysis of the Muzio. Interesting enough, William Lewis wrote in the preface to the book: "The Editor [Lewis] takes this opportunity of saying a few words respecting this celebrated player. A long and intimate acquaintance with Mr. Sarratt, during which he frequently had the pleasure of playing with him, and of seeing him play, enables the Editor to assert, without hesitation, that he was the finest and most finished player he has ever seen, alike excellent in attack and defencs, and capable of unravelling intricate positions with ease and accuracy.
Those who form their opinion of Mr. Sarratt’s skill from his publications only, will not rank him so high as he deserved, for Mr. S. was, unfortunately, too regardless of his fame to pay that attention to his Works which the reader has a right to expect. The pecuniary difficulties in which he was unfortunately involved, compelled him to write rapidly, and made him gladly prefer copying games from other books to giving new ones, which would have required a careful and laborious examination."

His posthumous book brought in some income, but his wife moved to Paris, supporting herself by giving chess instruction to the wealthy and aristocatic.  In 1843 a subscription was raised for her financial support.  Many chess amateurs contributed, as did "Le Palamède" (the chess magazine) and even King Louis-Philippe. Jacob Henry Sarratt encouraged, and suceeded in, changing the Stalemate rule, (which in England and many other countries at that time was that the side giving Stalemate lost)  to being a draw.  He was also instumental in naming the opening now called the Sicilian by pointing out that it was first demonstrated by Carerra, a Sicilian.  There are very few of Sarratt's games extant and most of those are, like Greco's games, studies rather than necessarily actual games played (though they might have been).  Here is an example taken from his 1808 "Treatise":

Even as Sarratt was ruling chess in London, Paris remained the place to play. Philidor's students, Bernard, Carlier and Leger took Phildor's place, but were too lacking to truly supplant him.

Around 1798 a French player worthy of Philidor's crown appeared almost out of nowhere. His sudden emergence was compounded by his nearly mythical claims and deeds. He was Alexandre Louis Honoré Lebreton Deschapelles who claimed to have learned all he needed to know about chess in just four days.

According to George Walker, Deschapelles noted:
           "I acquired chess, in four days! I learned the moves, played
            with Bernard, who had succeeded Philidor as the sovereign of
            the board; lost the first day, the second, the third, and beat
            him even-handed on the fourth; since which time I have never
            advanced or receded. Chess to me has been, and is, a single
            idea, which, once acquired, cannot be displaced from its throne,
            while the intellect remains unimpaired by sickness or age."

It's true that Deschapelles had a facility for games and excelled, not only at chess, but at billiards, Polish draughts, trictrac, and whist despite the fact that he had lost his right hand in a battle during his youth. In that same battle he received a sabre cut that opened his skull diagonally from his forehead to his chin, disfiguring him and inspiring the belief that such a wound actually freed his brain, empowering his mind.

 His father and brothers had been in the service of Louis XVI. During the French Revolution, they fled France.  Deschapelles, himself, was a revolutionary and received his wounds fighting for Napoleon - but when Napoleon crowned himself Emperor, he turned against him and tore off the Cross of Honor which had been conferred on him June 1, 1804, one of the first ever issued.

Taking up chess in 1798, Deschapelles quickly took up residence at, and figuratively ruled, the Café de la Régence. In 1806, after the battle of Jenna, the army to which Descapelles was attached entered Berlin. There Descapelles challenged the best chess players of Germany and won, giving them rook's odds. (something later disputed by the English press - instigating a hasty, ill-fated challenge from Deschapelle to the British chess players.)

One anecdote tells us that a stranger came into la Régence one day and inquired from the manager, Masson, whether Deschapelles would play him a game. Deschapelles had the manager find out what the stakes would be and the stranger said that his religion prohibited him to play for money.  Deschapelles sent word that his religion prohibited from being absurd ("La mienne me défend d’être absurde").

In 1812, Deschapelles was making a good living as a superintendant of the tobacco monopoly, a post granted to him by Napoleon's aide, Marshall Ney (through the insistance of Ney's wife, Duchess of Elchingen).

In 1815, after Waterloo, Deschapelles formed a band of partisans which named him their general. It didn't last long. In 1820, Deschapelles took on Labourdonnais as a student.

In 1822, Deschapelles gave up chess, most likely because Laourdonnais by now was the better player. He took up whist and quickly mastered the game winning more money at this game than he ever had at chess. With his new found wealth, he and his bride rented a villa near Paris where he raised orchards, pheasants, pumpkins, melons as well as pineapples and orchids in his greenhouses.  His melons and pumpkins even won prizes and were so highly valued, they were served to King Louis-Philippe.   George Perigal  was an English player who, incidentally, took part in the first telegraph game in England in 1845 as well as being on the London team in the correspondence matches against Edinburgh in 1824 and Paris in 1834.  Perigal, secretary of the London Chess Club, was in charge of handling the English negotiations with Deschappelles who had  challenged to play any English player at Pawn&2.  After the English raised the necessary 500£ stakes, Deschappelles withdrew his challenge,  inspiring Perigal to write:
            "M. Deschapelles is the greatest chess player in France;
             M. Deschapelles is the greatest whist player in France;
             M. Deschapelles is the greatest billiards player in France;
             M. Deschapelles is the greatest pumpkin-grower in France;
             M. Deschapelles is the greatest liar in France."

Deschapelles resumed playing chess in 1836 when, after 14 years of non-play, he drew a 3 game match (+1 =1 -1) against Saint-Amant giving Saint-Amant odds of Pawn&2.  He won a 5 game match (+2 =2 -1) against Wilhelm Schulten of Germany in 1842 also at odds of Pawn&2. He then played Saint-Amant a 5 game match winning +3 -2.

In 1839, Deschapelles published his "Traité du Whiste" ("Treatise on Whist"),  even though he had only completed  2 of the expected 15 chapters. But in 1842, he sent Saint-Amant another chapter to be published in "Le Palamède."

For the last year and a half of his life, Deschapelles was confined to bed. He suffered delusions which he expressed by composing rambling constitutions for various countries. His final wishes were that he should die unannounced and unheralded, buried in a pauper's grave.

Deschapelles did manage to redirect the focus of chess from London back to Paris during the 19th cenury's second decade.

What I would ask Willard Fiske, were I to meet him in some dark alley in some back corner of London, would be: "What English work is less mutilated?" For it seems to me that aside from Sarratt's "translation", GoogleBooks doesn't offer much of the works of Damiano, Lopez, and Salvio. Inasmuch as a fair number of Greco's games were lifted from these earlier writers, it would be helpful to have something of value.


Great start, batgirl! 

Daniel Willard Fiske, who organized the 1857 chess congress and wrote the Congress Book was, among other things, a linguist. I don't know why he was so harsh with Sarratt. Chances are Fiske read those authors in their original as he was fluent in Italian (he retired to Italy) and, as head librarian of Cornell University, he had access to rare books and maintained a large personal chess library. I can also imagine, as a logophile and a bibliophile, he would be more critical than most people. Maybe he didn't subscribe to the notion that anything is better than nothing.

But in "Chess Tales & Miscellanies" he wrote:
"The works of Gianutio and Gustavus Selenus on the game of chess; translated and arranged by J. H. Sarratt, Professor of Chess, Author and Editor of several publications on the game, &c. London, printed for J. Ebbers by B. McMuIIen. 1817. 2 vols., 8vo.
The first volume contains xxi + 233 pages and is devoted to Gianuzio. The so-called translation of Selenus occupies the two hundred and forty pages of the second volume. Like all the hastily prepared publications of Sarratt, it is so mutilated as to be of little value."

Intriguing as usual. 

awesome write up. 

This is (allegedly) one...

The 1820s is when chess starts getting lively.   

As we look at some of our targeted countries we see Germany with little happening.  But Germany was a place where chess was definitely being played. One of the great chess masters of the time, Johann Allgaier, had  writtenthe first modern chess book in German.  Published in 1796, "Neue Theoretische-praktische Anweisung zum  Schachspiel" was considered among the best chess books written up to that time. Allgaier was also hired by Johann Maelzel  as the first director of the automaton known as the Turk. The Turk was created by Wolfgang von Kempelen in 1770 and was  exhibited in Europe. After Kempelen's death, the automaton was bought by Maelzel who planned to make it part of his  traveling show. The Turk with Allgaier directing (Maelzel call the hidden operators "directors") did defeat Napoleon.  There are many versions of this story. However, it's almost certain that the game score purported to be between Napoleon and the Turk is fabricated, as it's equally certain that Napoleon's other 2 "preserved" games were manufactured.  Interestingly enough, a  second German from Alsace, William Schlumberger, was also a director of the Turk, but in the United States.  However, Schlumberger got his start in the Café de la Régence in the early 1820s and went with Maelzel to America in 1827. The Turk had been a major boost to chess' popularity, especially under the ownership of Maelzel the showman.

As far as  America  goes, the Turk's 10 year visit was the country's most enterprising chess happening.  Charles Vezin of Philidlphia was probably the strongest player in America and he started the first chess group or club in America in the Athenaeum in 1827 and was a frequent opponent of Schlumberger, the man not the automaton.  Vezin taught many of the next generation of American players and as such played an indespensible role in American chess.

France saw the advent of Louis-Charles Mahé de La Bourdonnais who supplanted Deschapelles upon his retirement from  chess in 1821.  The Turk was directed by Hyacinthe Boncourt in mainland Europe and by another French player, Jacques François Mouret, in London.  In London before Mouret was brought over, the Turk had been directed by William Lewis followed  by Peter Unger Williams both of whom had been students of Sarratt.  Mouret had been a student of Carlier and Bernard and then of Dechapelles and had been a teacher to Labourdonnais.  His exhibition, playing as the Turk, in 1819 was recorded and 50 games, played at the odds of Pawn & move, were published.  Of Mouret's 300 games as the Turk, he only lost 6.  Alcoholism destroyed Mouret both as a chess player and as a man.  In 1834 Mouret supposedly revealed the secret of the automaton supposedly for the price of a drink and this somewhat oblique revelation was published in an article in "Le Magasin Pittoresque" in 1834. According to his obituary in "Le Palaméde," Mouret had become paralyzed in all his limbs and was in constant pain towards the end of his life. He retained a small, insufficient pension from the post office where he had been formerly employed but this stipend was supplemented through a monthly donation by members of the Paris chess circle who also paid for his burial.  

The best English players in 1820 were William Lewis and John Cochrane. Cochrane, a Scottish player, is first heard of receiving Pawn & move odds in London from Mouret, as the Turk and delivering Mouret one of his 6 losses. In 1822 (at age 24) Cochane published "A Treatise on the Game of Chess." In 1824, he was part of the London team in their correspondence match with Edinburgh.  In the third game,  Cochrane  convinced his team to play a little known opening, perhaps as a surprise since it was only briefly mentioned by Ercole Del Rio in 1750 and, of course, by his Modenese protégé, Giambattista Lolli in 1763: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4.  This game was looking favorable for White, but Cochrane took a position in India and had to leave mid-game. After he departed White's game fell apart and black eventually won. The Scots beat the Scotch Game the first time it was recorded OTB. (The Edinbugh players, who apparently liked Cochrane's idea,  played the Scotch Game two times in the match, drawing one and winning one - and the match).

Cochrane vs. The Turk (Mouret):

H. J. R. Murray wrote a two-part biography of Lewis published in the "BCM" in 1906.  I created the culled version of Part I below:

"Meanwhile, on April 6th, 1807, a new chess club had arisen farther East in the City itself, which took the name of the London Chess Club. Its first president was a Mr. Augustus Hankey, but although the first committee contained men of note such as Sir Astley Cooper, the surgeon, and Sir Isaac Lyon Goldsmid, the club was composed mainly of City men for whom Parsloe's was too far West and too exclusive. Here, soon after the foundation of the club, a schoolmaster, J. H. Sarratt, came to the front as a player of the first rank, who played with a brilliance that had not been seen in England for nearly a hundred years. He discarded the dull Bishop's Opening, which to the disciples of Philidor was the most correct of all openings, and rehabilitated the King's Gambit, and specially the Muzio. But he was more than a mere player; he wrote two treatises on the game, the earlier of which was published in 1808, and published three volumes of translations containing the works of the earlier writers on chess—Damiano, Ruy Lopez, Gianutio, Salvio, and Gustavus Selenus—in 1813 and 1817. These works are not, however, calculated to enhance his renown; they lack unity and bear signs of hasty composition. Lewis refers to this in his preface to his own translation of Carrera where he tells us how Sarratt had distinguished himself in play with Verdoni, but that the latter player only judged Sarratt from his books, and never really realised his great skill as a player. Sarratt was too careless of his reputation to expend quite the same care on his books as on his games.
...
The next year (1817) saw Lewis' first appearance as a compiler of chess hooks. A copy of Tiruvengadacharya Shastri's "Essays on Chess adapted to the European Mode of Play" which had been published in Bombay, 1814, was lent him by a friend, Joseph Wood. Lewis embodied the greater portion of the problems in this book in his 'Oriental Chess," a collection of 150— for that time—excellent problems, a few of which were the compiler's own. Notwithstanding the fact that Lewis makes ample acknowledgment of his indebtedness to the Bombay work and has placed an "E" against every problem taken from it, there have not been wanting writers who have accused Lewis of making his reputation upon stolen material—a charge which cannot be substantiated. Lewis' book possesses a special interest for the collector from its being one of the first two chess books—and possibly the very first one*—in which the problem diagrams were printed with moveable type.

This same year—1817—Lewis played the first of his two matches with Peter Pratt. Pratt was not a strong player (Lewis gave him the odds, now of the Queen's Rook, now of a Knight in both matches, and beat him), but he was a persistent editor of Philidor, whom he endeavoured to "improve" in many ways. Thus he tried to reform chess nomenclature by substituting new names for the pieces, which he thought more appropriate for modern days. ... Beside this he tried to reform castling, and other rules, and fought hard for the older English convention that the giver of stalemate lost the game threby....

William Lewis directed the Automaton's play for some time, and two of his games played in this way are preserved in his "Fifty Games; No. 43, a Sicilian, is Lewis v. H. Wilson, and No. 50 (also in Walker's " Chess Studies," No. 461) is Lewis v. Williams. [Peter Unger] Williams also directed the Automaton for some time, but both were succeeded by Mouret, who for six months gave Pawn and move to all comers, only losing six out of three hundred games; fifty of these games were published in a small volume in 1820, and are preserved in Walker's "Chess Studies," an invaluable collection of games played before 1844.

Somewhere about this time, John Cochrane began to play at the London Club. He can barely have been out of his teens when he sprang the Cochrane Gambit on its members. He was a player of rare originality, who was always introducing new lines of play which in the end all proved to be unsound, but, as novelties, were not to be despised Lewis was easily his superior; he was giving him the Knight in 1820 ("Fifty Games," No. 12. is Lewis v. Cochrane, March 15th, 1820) and Pawn and two when Cochrane left London for India in 1826 (Walker's "Chess Studies," No. 457). Yet it is by no means improbable that Lewis' first leanings to analysis were the result of Cochrane's novelties. By the death of Sarratt somewhere about 1820, Lewis became the undisputed leader of English chess. From this period he styles himself "Teacher of Chess" on his title-pages; Sarratt's title, "Professor of Chess," he never adopted.

The same year a chess event of greater importance happened. In April, 1821, Lewis and Cochrane visited Paris, and encountered Deschapelles and Labourdonnais in play. At this time Deschapelles was at the height of his fame, while Labourdonnais had not yet surmounted the odds of Pawn and two. Lewis met Deschapelles at the odds of Pawn and move, and of the thiee games played he won one and drew the other two. Labourdonnais and Cochrane received the odds of Pawn and two, Labourdonnais winning, and Cochrane losing the majority of the games. Labourdonnais also proved himself superior to Cochrane, playing level. Finally Cochrane challenged Deschapelles to play on level terms, Deschapelles laying double stakes to Cochrane's single. Under these terms Cochrane came off without loss of money, which means that he must have won one game in every three. This result would seem incredible if it were not remembered that Deschapelles possessed no book-knowledge of the openings, and almost exclusively played at the odds of Pawn and move, or Pawn and two, and the so-called Game of Pawns in which one player gave his Queen for eight additional pawns Lewis' games are all preserved in Chess Studies (Nos. 421-423). It is interesting to read Lewis' statement: "Des. and myself finished our three games in four hours and we were both slow players."

In 1822 both Cochrane and Lewis published books. But while the former confined himself to a single work, the "Treatise on the Game of Chess" which George Walker praised so highly, Lewis was far busier. There was the new edition of Sarratt's work of 1808, which was another repayment of his indebtedness to his old master, there was his own "Elements on the Game of Chess" (a treatise on the endings), and the translation of Carrera's work to complete the series of translations begun by Sarratt. Such literary activity can have left but little leisure for chess, and the pause that was thus entailed marks as near as maybe the end of the dominion of Philidor's principles in England in their original form."

Chess reporting - newspaper chess columns, perodical chess columns, chess periodicals - started in the early 1800s but the start was rather rocky.

The first newspaper chess column appeared in the "Liverpool Mercury" on July 9, 1813 and ended on August 20,1814. As can be seen below in the July 16, 1813 column used a board diagram, but it was unicolored. The chess column was edited by its general editor and founder, Egerton Smith.

This column lasted about a year and it would be another two decades before another newspaper chess column would appear but that one would last four four decades.  It was George Walker's column in "Bell's Life in London and Sporting Chronicle" starting in 1834-5.

The first chess column to appear in a periodical, oddly enough, was in the weekly medical journal "The Lancet."

"The Lancet" first appeared on Oct. 5, 1823 and the first chess column on Oct. 19, 1823 with the title "Origin of the Game of Chess" :

Subsequent columns would be entitled, "Chess Problems."  Twenty year old George Walker edited this column.  "The Lancet,"  being a high-minded medical magazine, besides publishing medical articles, also published topics, such as drama and chess, that the editors felt contributed to the medical student's intellectual growth. One of the peculiar features of this chess column was that it gave its problems with no diagrams.

The first periodical with a focus on chess (although, like many that would follow, also covered other games such as draughts and whist) was years away.  The French magazine, ''Le Palamède,'' was founded by Labourdonnais and Joseph Méry in 1836.

A name to remember in all this is that of George Walker.

A "lancet" is a medical instrument, still in limited used today, which is used to drain boils and carbuncles, blood-letting, or opening lesions that needed to be drained.

You would know.

Lets' talk about George Walker for a moment, but for just a moment since, while the 1820s did bring his name to the forefront, his monumental contributions came a little later.

Trying to compare the chess scene Walker found when he first took and interest in the game to the chess scene of his later life, Murray wrote:
"Neither as analyst nor as player did Walker ever come near William Lewis. On the other hand, his chess column in Bell's Life in London, his pleasant articles on chess topics in Eraser's and other magazines, his pioneer work in the organization of the chess life of the West End of London created a wider enthusiasm for chess than Lewis ever succeeded in raising. It was with pardonable pride that Walker could, in the later years of his life, compare the wide-spread activity of chess that he lived to see with the want of interest that existed in the earlier days of his career, for that change of attitude was to a very great extent the direct result of his own disinterested labours. He often told how, in his early days, somewhere about 1826, he had found himself benighted in an inn at Stratford-onAvon with another traveller, who proved to be a chess-player also. Unluckily, they could not beguile the tedium of the evening with chess, for the inn could only produce a backgammon board, and all attempts to discover chessboard or men in the town proved fruitless. Twenty years later, in telling the story at a meeting of the Yorkshire Chess Association, he could add that Stratford was no longer so ignorant a town, and that the very inn where he had stayed had become a resort of chess-players."

Walker's father was also named George. He had been a bookseller and an author of little repute. Little George became a partner in that business (which eventually only sold music books) until his father died, after which he became a stock broker until old age and loss of visual acuity forced him to retire.   George Waker was the chess editor of the "Lancet," which ran the first chess column ever in a periodical. He was only 20 at the time. Three years later, Walker formed one of the first chess clubs in London (thought not *the* first) at the Percy Hotel, called the Percy Chess Club.  According to Walker himself, "'The Percy Chess Club.' Looking back, I must own I never have enjoyed Chess so much since. We formed a band of brothers, and the worse we played, I suppose, the more we liked it. We began our evening with tea and coffee, and made up pleasant parties for hot suppers, which were not always over by the prescribed hour of eleven. We numbered, the first winter, about twenty members, including the brothers John and William Marks, Messrs. Weiss, Skelton, Senior Ferrier, Duncan Forbes, &c. We gravely printed rules, appointed President, Secretary, and all the rest of it, and went on our way rejoicing. As far as I can remember, our maximum on the roll was thirty to forty members."
...
"We first discovered what Chess was really like, on the introduction, by Mr. Ferrier, of a new member, Mr. Murphy, who played the gambit and beat us all round. Mr. Murphy was eminent as a miniature painter; and at his house, in Grosvenor Street, I had the pleasure of playing Chess on several occasions with his charming daughter, afterwards Mrs. Jamieson, whose bust at South Kensington conveys but a faint idea of her interesting features. A first-rate player could have given Mr. Murphy a piece; but his style was brilliant, always on the look-out for a dashing sacrifice; and under my repeated defeats, I soon gained some efficiency.
The Percy Chess Club, in its second year, seemed firmly established, when it was knocked down by two events of a very different nature. Murphy brought Mr. Lewis on a visit to the Society, who gave our best men the Rook, and beat us to our hearts' content; and, about the same time, the proprietor of the Percy gave us notice to quit, as we did not spend cash enough to make our presence remunerative."
...
"we had sniffed at the apple of knowledge, as held out by Lewis, and finally broke up our meeting in favour of a sort of Chess Class, which Mr. Lewis opened, Wednesday and Saturday evenings, at a house in St. Martin's Lane, and where we found, too late, that we had exchanged our pleasant gatherings for a very dry kind of affair indeed. But it was impossible to retreat. We sat our time out, playing with each other, in silence and in gloom; for, as there was no eating and drinking, the very shadow of a bit of pleasant chaff was unknown, and I longed frequently, but in vain, for the lost flesh pots of Egypt I was firm, however, to Mr. Lewis's Class for several years, the details of which were wearisome to give here, till Mr. Lewis formally and wisely abjured Chess altogether, and became actuary of the Family Endowment Society."

One of the more important events of the 1820s was the introduction of the Belfast player, Alexander M'Donnell.  In 1816, at age 18, he took a merchant position in the Dutch colony of Demerara in Guyana in the West Indies. Around 1820 he became the Secretary of the Committee of West Indian Merchants, moved to London and took up with William Lewis.

Howard Staunton wrote in the "Chess Player's Chronicle in 1843:
 "Alexander M'Donnell had quietly worked' his way to the very apex of Chess skill, distancing all his competitors. A long series of games with Mr. Lewis (the veteran giving M'Donnell the Pawn) had completed his studies; and the secession of his master from the arena, left the pupil to reign without the trouble of conquest. As I have before said, (and not said invidiously or unkindly, towards one who has done so much for Chess,) Mr. Lewis discontinued difficult games, and justly, therefore, refused more than one invitation in my hearing to play on even terms with his quondam pupil."

M'Donnell had a short life and the apex of his chess career would come just shortly before his death in the next decade.

In the wake of British abolition, commerce in the West Indies underwent severe changes. Many lost fortunes. It was in this context that M'Donnell moved from the West Indies to London. 

M'Donnell and M. de la Bourdonnais both came from families deeply entrenched in colonial trade. 

Is this presupposing they were slave traders?   I'm really not aware of the nature of their trade.  I know Labourdonnais' grandfather worked for the Fr. East India Trade Co. running a fleet of ships... in fact, our Labourdonnais was born on an island off of the east coast of Africa,  Île de Bourbon, of which his grandfather had been governor at one time and  which had been originally colonized by the French East India Company. Apparently this company fell victim to the French Revolution and actually disbanned even before our Labourdonnais was born.

Information on Labourdonnais' father is less forthcoming.  However, his father died when Labourdonnais was only 15. Still, he was able to attend the exclusive Collège Henri IV in Paris. Labourdonnais' inheritance, however, had been depleted through some ill-advised building speculations and, as he had no profession, chess became his savior.

No.

However, slavery infused all aspects of the British economy at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Even more, slavery was the foundation of British economic activity in the West Indies, and also French economic activity there. The Dutch were at the center of the slave trade.

I do not know M'Donnell's views towards the slave trade, nor his family's specific involvement. The timing of his rise in London might suggest that he occupied a void created by abolition. Things are rarely that simple, however.

I simply do not know, but would be interested if you dug up any clues. More about his economic activities must be known. They certainly were known to Walker. 

Tea or spices would be my first guess for de la Bourdonnais.*

*The spelling of Labourdonnais, de la Bourdonnais, etc troubles many. You spelling is the one in ChessBase database. La Bourdonnais is the name of a street in Paris that honors his father. Cary Utterberg offers good reasons for De la Bourdonnais. See http://chessskill.blogspot.com/2014/11/mcdonnell-de-la-bourdonnais-1834-index.html 

I was curious about the inferences, if there were any. I'd never heard of either the La Bourdonnais family or McDonnell dealing in slaves. I think the slave trade was abolished in England when McDonnell was still a child.

About La Bourdonais, I used to call him Bourdonnais but some time ago was apprised by epoqueepique, who is French and very wise, that this was incorrect. She also maintains that "De la Bourdonnais" is also wrong.

"Just one point, La Bourdonnais is his name. De la Bourdonnais is wrong, one is not supposed to start with the 'particule' "de", except for one syllable names (for example, one says de Thou, not Thou). Bourdonnais is impossible in French, it would be equivalent to calling McDonnell Donnell. French rules about aristocratic patronyms without their first names...which even the french get mixed up with."

So, I started calling him Labourdonnais as I've seen it expressed that way in contemporary writings.  Of course I've seem "de la Bourdonnais" and "La Bourdonnais" also. There may be some fine points of usage I don't understand.

I liked the blog on M'Donnell-Labourdonnais. Thanks.

I prefer La Bourdonnais, but I've been all over the place. French is a foreign language to me.

Few people actually dealt in slaves. But, if the trade is tea, sugar is essential. Sugar and slavery are inseparable in the nineteenth century. The last three nations to abolish slavery, USA, Cuba, Brasil, were all sugar producers. The USA was not a major one, however. Cuba abolished slavery in 1878 (off the top of my head, could be off by a year or two). Brasil in 1888. Cuba was the leading sugar producer after the revolution in Saint Domingue (Haiti).

The 1820s supplied some of the building blocks for the development of a chess culture in England. France already had a chess culture that centered around the cafés, particularly the Café de la Régence.   Although the players in la  Régence had their own Cercle des Echecs that met in the upstairs rooms, chess in France was rather chaotic.  The English  were focused on organization.  The French seemed to like to gather for camaradie and while gathered, play chess. The English on the other hand gathered to play chess with fellowship secondary.   

The London Chess Club, located in Cornhill, was founded in 1807.  Its members consisted primarily of city merchants and members of the stock exchange. Since it was opened only in the middle of the day, it excluded anyone outside the city proper and anyone who was free to play only in the evenings. Additionally, as it was the only chess club in town, it's membership consisted of the best players over the years, players such as Cochrane, Lewis, Fraser, Mercier, Pratt and Brand. Young  potential members found these players more intimidating than engaging.   In the West End people played in coffee houses for money but there was no chess club. George Walker was determined to see an accessible chess club established there.  His first attempt was in the Percy Hotel on Rathbone Place. It was an affable group but without experienced leadership a rather weak one.   When William Lewis visited and beat it's best players at Rook-odds, he saw potential clients and opened a place in the same general area on St. Martin's Lane.  When the Percy Hotel wouldn't renew their lease, the members gravitated to Lewis' place. Many members of the London Club followed their leading player and it's here where we first see Alexander  M'Donnell, recently returned from the West Indies, in London and the last we see of John Cochrane who was leaving for India. Other members included Peter Pratt, who authored one of the strangest books in chess history (his "Chess Studies" offered such important information as : "The Dislodging Faculty is a measure of competency in the assailant to compel a removal, multiplied into the Power of Transitive Attack, or a modification of it."), Richard Penn (the great -grandson of William Penn) who authored a rather enjoyable book called "Maxims and Hints for Chess Players and  Anglers," Francis Merier, a long-time student of Lewis who owned one of the finest chess libraries at that time and who  gave up public chess out of deference once M'Donnell rose to fame, Henry G. Bohn, the bookseller and publisher and  Popert who taught Charles Stanley the finer points of the game.  Another member was Mr. Brand (Brande).  I don't know  much about him, but Frederick Edge in his book on Morphy's Exploits in Europe (Edge befriended George Walker and wrote down some of what he was told)  gave the following simply fascinating anecdote:
     As though not sufficiently humiliated, Mr. Murphy introduced Mr. Lewis to them, and the new-comer completed their  bewilderment by giving them the Rook and sweeping them clean off the board. But with such a master, the Percies, by dint  of diligent study and practice, rapidly improved, and it was suggested to Mr. Lewis that he should open a private club at his  own house. After a short delay this was accomplished, and nearly all the members joined Mr. Lewis, when he opened  subscription rooms in St. Martin's Lane—classic ground surely, for a former Chess Club had lived and died at Slaughter's  Coffee-House, hard by.
     Mr. Lewis collected quite a number of players around him, and was in fair way to find his enterprise profitable; but the most  prominent members demurred to his not playing with them so much as they desired, more especially as Mr. Lewis did not  appear to regard the institution as a Free School for the inculcation of Chess. The best of the young amateurs were  Messrs. Walker, Brand, Mercier and McDonnell; the last, the best of the lot. McDonnell received from Mr. Le
s the odds of  Pawn and Two Moves; but when he had fairly surmounted that advantage and could win every game, his antagonist  declined playing on even terms, much to McDonnell's disappointment. This, however, appears to be the usual course with  leading chess players,—Deschappelles' conduct in regard to' Labourdonnais being a notable example of the fact. There  are peculiar idiosyncrasies in chess human nature, as, for instance, the remarkable reserve and "don't-come-nigh-me"  feeling with which leading amateurs treat each other. Go into any public or private chess association, and you will find that  the superior craft steer clear of each other, as a general thing; reserving their antagonism for matches few and far between.
     The Club subsequently removed to the bottom of St. Martin's Lane, and shortly broke up, McDonnell and others returning to  the London Club, whence they had migrated. A futile attempt was afterwards made to establish a grand aristocratic silk and  satin club in Waterloo Place, the door of admission to which could only be opened with a golden key of ten guineas. Here  lots of everything could be found except chess, and no wonder, for the game does not find supporters, to any extent, among  the rich, depending mainly upon individuals to whom ten guineas are a consideration. The club expired in twelve months.  Caissa thus lost her last foothold at the West End, and Mr. Lewis henceforth virtually abandoned the practice of Chess.
     The question has frequently been asked, whether and how Mr. Lewis played Labourdonnais? They played together on three  different occasions, in all seven games, of which Labourdonnais won five and lost two. The first time they met was at the  house of Mr. Domitt. Hon. Sec. of the London Club, and two Allgaier Gambits were played, each winning one. As they had  just done their duty to a very good dinner, and society was then divided into two, three, and four bottle men, Labourdonnais  remarked, "The victory is not likely to be gained by the better player, but by him who carries his wine best." This reminds  me of a bon mot of Mr. Boden. Somebody remarked in his presence that two amateurs (whose names it is unnecessary to  mention) were both drunk, though engaged in a match game: he replied—" Then the best player will win."
     After the conclusion of the two games, Messrs. Merrier, Bonfil and Domitt, particular friends of the English player,  challenged Labourdonnais to play Mr. Lewis a match of twenty-five games at £5 a game. This was rather too bad,  considering that Labourdonnais, to use his own words, was '' without a friend or a shilling in a foreign country;" but he  laughed the challenge away as a joke in his own witty manner, by saying that "in such case he must be the best player who  could offer to play for the highest stake," a reply which so pleased a gentleman present, Mr. Brand, that he cried out, ''  Labourdormais shall play Lewis a match of 25 games at £10 a game, and I will find his stakes." It is stated that Mr. Brand  evinced considerable ill-feeling towards Mr. Lewis, at the time, in consequence of the latter's preferring a move  recommended by Mr. Mercier in the match then pending between the London and Edinburgh Clubs, to one proposed by  himself, and perhaps this was the reason for his offering to back the Frenchman against his own countryman. But Mr.  Lewis's friends did not accept the challenge, and the two champions confined their contest to five off-hand games, which  were played at the residences of Messrs. Bonfil and Mercier, Lewis winning one and Labour donnais four, so that the final  result was:—
                         Labourdonnais, 5—Lewis, 2—Drawn, 0.
     The above occurrences took place on the occasion of Labourdonnais's first visit to London, many years before his famous  encounters with McDonnell.