by David Lawson
Throughout his college years it was periodically noted in the college records that Paul’s “conduct was excellent, application very earnest and un-remitting and improvement very rapid.” Existing college records, though very incomplete (for Spring Hill College has suffered two disastrous fires since Morphy’s days there), show that he received many awards and pre-miums for his studies in languages (Latin, Greek, French, and English), mathematics, and all other subjects during his college years.
Apart from studies of a serious nature, Morphy took an active part in dramatics and rhetoric. In his first year he was elected president of the Thespian Society and throughout his years at college he took important roles in the plays presented by the students.
At the Annual Commencement, October 14, 1851, he took the part of Charles in the Comédie Française play Grégoire. At the following commencement he played Portia in The Merchant of Venice, his brother taking the part of Shylock.
The diversity of his interests is indicated by his June 1853 “Latin Analysis of Cicero’s Oration pro Marcello,” which, the Spring Hill College records state, “evinced his ability to appreciate the merits of that beautiful Oration.” Also discussed in the college records was his discourse as a member of the Philomatic Society in February 1854, when he “delivered a lecture on Astronomy & particularly the discovery of the Planet Le Verrier [Neptune] & those of Sir Wm. Herschel among the Nebula.”
Father Kenny, S.J., author of The Torch on the Hill, writes in reference to Morphy’s address at the 1854 Commencement, at which Paul received the A.B. degree:
War was the subject of his graduating thesis, and he brought within very narrow limits the conditions that make it justifiable. The logic of his argument would exclude forcible secession, and whether in play or in life Morphy was severely logical, even to a fault. But such a course brought consequences that preyed upon his mind.
In passing, it is of interest to take note of Morphy’s stand on war and secession, as revealed in the above passage. Perhaps it will help to explain the motives for his behavior during the Civil War, which was later to have such tragic effects on him, his career, his family, and his fortune.
Morphy stayed on at Spring Hill another year, and Maurian later noted that Paul graduated with the highest honors ever awarded by the institution and occupied himself almost exclusively with mathematics and philosophy. At the 1855 Commencement, at which he received his A.M. degree, Morphy took for the subject of his address, “The Political Creed of the Age.”
During his years at Spring Hill, Morphy devoted himself to his studies and college activities, almost completely to the exclusion of chess. It would seem he had little interest in it at the time. In fact, Maurian says in his long obituary in the New Orleans Times-Democrat of July 13, 1884, that
his [Morphy’s] departure for Spring Hill in the autumn of the same year [1850] seems to have caused a prolonged interruption in the youthful prodigy’s practice of the game, for excepting such play as he may have had at home during his brief vacations, they lasted from October 15 to December 1, he may be said to have virtually abandoned chess during his collegiate career.
It was only in the summer of 1853, the year before his graduation, that, to oblige some college mates who had become enthusiastic over chess, he played with them a number of games and these at odds of Queen or of Rook and Knight combined.
Later in the same obituary, Maurian makes an even stronger statement concerning Paul’s interest in the game:
Speaking as knowing whereof we speak, we deem it but just to correct two generally received impressions as to the departed master. First, then, Paul Morphy was never so passionately fond, so inordinately devoted to chess as is generally believed. An intimate acquaintance and long observation enables us to state this positively. His only devotion to the game, if it may be so termed, lay in his ambition to meet and to defeat the best players and great masters of this country and of Europe. He felt his enormous strength, and never for a moment doubted the outcome. Indeed, before his first departure for Europe he privately and modestly, yet with perfect confidence, predicted to us his certain success, and when he returned he expressed the conviction that he had played poorly, rashly; that none of his opponents should have done so well as they did against him. But, this one ambition satisfied, he appeared to have lost nearly all interest in the game.
In her Life of Paul Morphy, Regina Morphy-Voitier includes the following reminiscence of Maurian’s:
Paul and I [during their years at Spring Hill College] happened to be placed adjoining each other in the study rooms, in the class rooms and everywhere, and our previous acquaintance soon ripened into great intimacy. For a year or two I may say that I hardly lost sight of him except for about six weeks at vacation time, and during that whole time I never saw Paul play a single game of Chess. He never talked Chess to anyone nor probably gave it a thought. He had neither a Chess board nor even a Chess book. At Spring Hill he continued to be the close student he had been at Jefferson Academy in New-Orleans, and his intellectual superiority over his companion soon became manifest to all there as it had been in earlier days. I have heard one of his professors, a man of mature years and great experience, say that of the thousands and thousands of boys and youths that came under his observation in long years devoted to teaching the young, he had never met anyone that could compare with Paul Morphy in strength and capacity of intellect. Unfortunately, this could not be said of the physical man. While his mental faculties were being constantly enlarged and strengthened by constant study, his physical frame did not receive a corresponding development by that active exercise of the body so necessary at his prime of life, and there was not that equilibrium between the two so essential to the perfection of both.
He never could vanquish his repugnance for the sports that are so attractive. He saw, however, the necessity of doing something, and for some months or perhaps a year, he took lessons in the art of fencing. He practiced a bit regularly, and it undoubtedly proved very beneficial to him. But it is to be regretted that he did not take this course earlier, and especially that it did not continue longer. It is my firm belief that later misfortune would have been thereby avoided.
About the year 1852 the first Chess board and men that I had seen at Spring Hill made their appearance under the joint property of Raphael Carraquesde of the City of Mexico and Louis Landry of Louisiana. These young gentlemen played frequently and initiated some of their companions into the mysteries of the game. Paul seldom took any part in this play except as referee, in cases where a point of Chess law was to be decided. On very rare occasions, he played a few games with them at the odds of Queen’s rook and Knight, and I believe was uniformly successful.
Sometime during the Spring of 1853 I happened to be in the College Infirmary for some trifling indisposition and Paul was also there for some similar complaint. Through strange chance, the Chess board of Raphael and Landry happened to be there also. Noticing the Chess board, the idea came into my head to ask Morphy the very stupid question which since then has often been put to me (retaliation), “How is it possible that two intelligent beings should sit for an hour or more moving little figures of white and black wood, and find recreation therein?”
“If you knew the game,” he answered, “you would change your opinion.” “Well,” I replied, “suppose you teach me the moves just to kill time, for I feel I shall never have the patience to play a game through.”
Paul taught me the moves. We then played several games for study, he explaining the reasons for the moves. After that sitting I had changed my mind and opinion, in fact I had suddenly jumped from one extreme to the other, and I could scarcely conceive how a man that did not play Chess could be happy. We remained two days in the Infirmary, and my first care in coming out was to procure a Chess board of my own, and I had all the book stores of Mobile and New-Orleans ransacked for Chess books, and gave a great deal more time to its study than I should. During the two years that we remained at college together, Morphy
played a considerable number of games with me at odds gradually diminishing as I improved. We seldom played more than a game at a sitting, but few of them lasted less than two or three hours. He did not play with any other adversary, except on a visit to Mobile with the professor of Spanish, Mr. Sanchez, who made a pretty good fight at odds of a Rook.
Mr. Morphy had the following Chess books with him, the only ones, as far as I know that he ever possessed until the New York Chess Congress in 1857. Horwitz and Kling’s Chess Studies, which he pronounced a very good and useful book for students, although not free from error; the B. Vols composing the collection of Kieseritzky’s La Régence, and Stuanton’s Chess Tournament. I had a translation of Lewis’ Treatise in French [and] Staunton’s Chess Player’s Handbook and Companion.
Paul never used books except for a few minutes at a time. But I believe that a great many of the games actually played that they contained were played by us, especially those by acknowledged first class players, such as Staunton, Anderssen and Kieseritsky. During the same year, he also played a considerable number of games with me at odds gradually diminishing as I improved.
Although Maurian very soon became too strong to receive the odds of Queen from Morphy, sixteen years were to pass before he became too strong to receive the odds of Queen’s Knight. An apt pupil, Maurian reduced his odds slightly during the first year of his apprenticeship, as shown by an entry in one of his notebooks, which he made, it would appear, expecting others to see it some day:
Note to Readers.
The game on the following page was played by correspondence between Messrs. Torda and Maurian and it ended in a draw. The games that come after this are from a little match played between Mr. P. M. and Maurian. This match consisted of nine games, in 3 of them Mr. P. M. was to give the odds of the Rook and Knight, in the 3 next, the odds of Rook, Pawn and 2 moves and in 3 others, the odds of Rook, Pawn and move. It was begun on Thursday the 20th of January 1854.
Of this match of nine games, Morphy won two and drew one of the first three. He won one and lost two of the second three, and won two and lost one of the last three. Among the games recorded in this notebook is one in which Maurian received the odds of Queen from Morphy, probably the first game between them that was recorded. In another Maurian notebook we find the following:
Chess Game—Charles Maurian 1856
On the 23rd of October, Charles Maurian commenced the present Chess games merely for the sake of amusement and pastime. I, the above named am a passionate admirer of the game of Chess, and although I have not yet succeeded in seeing over four or five moves, yet I do not despair of struggling one day at very small odds with Paul Morphy, the chess King of New Orleans. I will begin by a game played between us, at the time that Paul removed back again to Mr. Alonzo Morphy’s house of Royal Street, on Sunday 12 October 1856, Mr. Paul Morphy giving the odds of the Queen’s Knight and move.
Then followed the game, which was unknown to the chess world until Maurian published it in the New Orleans Times-Democrat on April 15, 1894, and it is still in no Morphy collection.
One day at Spring Hill, Father Beaudequin, who sometimes played chess with the students, happened to hear Paul remark that he thought he could beat his fellow classmates playing blindfolded. It is probable that the Father knew nothing of Paul’s prowess at chess, and so offered to play him. Paul played without sight of the board, and the Father was very much surprised when he lost.
It may be recalled that Ernest Morphy, in his letter to Kieseritzky in 1849, told him that “this child has never opened a work on chess,” and yet he was playing like a master at twelve years of age. Apparently he had little need of books or interest in having them. From what Maurian said, Paul seems never to have had any books on the subject of chess until 1853, when, probably due to Maurian’s enthusiasm, he acquired a few. Frederick Milne Edge, Morphy’s secretary in Europe, relates the following in his book The Exploits and Triumphs in Europe of Paul Morphy. (This book is the source of all quotations from Edge that will subsequently appear in this biography, unless a specific Edge letter is mentioned.)
In answer to a gentleman in Paris as to whether he [Morphy] had not studied many works on chess, I heard him state that no author had been of much value to him, and that he was astonished at finding various positions and solutions given as novel—certain moves producing certain results, etc., for that he had made the same deductions himself, as necessary consequences.
However, at the end of 1853 he acquired a copy of Staunton’s book of the 1851 London tournament, which he soon gave to James McConnell. McConnell said that upon opening it he found that Paul had expressed himself concerning some of the games with marginal notes and had amended the title page to read, “By H. Staunton, Esq., author of The Handbook of Chess, Chess-players Companion, &c. &c. &c. ‘and some devilish bad games.’” In 1874 he was to give a more considered opinion of Howard Staunton as chess master.
During his last year at Spring Hill, Morphy’s interest in chess, or shall we say chess activity, increased somewhat, probably as a consequence of Maurian’s enthusiasm, and the two made several trips to Mobile, undoubtedly with chess in mind. Morphy knew Judge Meek, who sat in court there, and he made the acquaintance of others. Judge Meek has told that he played Morphy several games on March 1, 1855, all of which Meek lost. While there, Paul played Dr. Ayers with equal success. He may also have played with the editor of the Mobile Weekly Register, with whom he was acquainted. One of the Register’s reporters published the following account in the paper’s October 13, 1855, issue, concerning the 1855 Spring Hill Commencement, at which Morphy delivered his graduation address, “The Political Creed of the Age”:
Spring Hill College—Mr. Editor, Four young men received the first Academical honor [yesterday]. I will mention only your friend, Mr. Paul Morphy of New Orleans, who, before being promoted to the Degree of A.M., delivered with an uncommon degree of earnestness a speech remarkable for solid argumentation and high philosophical principles.
In the Macon Telegraph of May 2, 1867, Miron Hazeltine, chess editor and chronicler of the Morphy era, related the following anecdote of another of Morphy’s visits to Mobile:
A good story passed current among the players and we believe got into print [ Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, October 11, 1856], to the effect that, Paul Morphy being in town [Mobile], during a session of the Court over which our subject [Judge Meek] presided, the Judge concocted some pretext for an adjournment for the day, went over to the hotel, and buried the anxiety of clients and the wranglings of Counsel in the willing oblivion of his favorite pastime, en lutte with his favorite young master. On being rallied about it he used to adjust his spectacles, and with a merry twinkle of his eyes, remark that he thought they embellished that a little at his expense.
After the 1855 Commencement, Paul returned to New Orleans and lost no time in matriculating at the University of Louisiana in November 1855. Applying himself closely to his studies, he received his law degree on April 7, 1857, as mentioned in the New Orleans Daily Creole of April 8, 1857:
Commencement Exercise—Law School University of Louisiana—The session for the present year of the Law Department of the Louisiana State University closed with appropriate exercises at Odd Fellow’s Hall. This department of the University is in most efficient organization, and has taken rank for sound learning among the first schools of the kind in America. . . . Christian Roselius, Professor of Civil Law and Dean of the Faculty, in some very appropriate and happily conceived remarks . . . conferred the honorary degree of L.L.B. on the following named gentlemen: Paul Morphy, . . . .
Blessed with an unusual memory, Morphy could easily recite by heart nearly the entire Civil Code of Louisiana. However, Paul was not immediately admitted to practice at the bar. Restrictions required that one be of legal age, and Morphy was obliged to wait more than a year before he could begin practicing his profession. It will never be known for a certainty whether this long wait was a determining factor in the cours
e of his future life.
As previously noted, Paul had played but little chess during his college years, none for the first two and a half years, except perhaps at home during vacation. One such vacation game is unusual because it ended with Paul giving mate by simply castling.
Some months before Paul expected to receive his law degree, knowing he would not be allowed to practice until the middle of the following year, he began to consider playing chess on a larger field, undoubtedly urged on by his Uncle Ernest, who was inordinately proud of him. Uncle Ernest, who had sent the Lowenthal game to Marache and Staunton, had also sent it to Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, which published it on August 23, 1856, together with the following notice:
We shall have more to say of this young chess genius next week. He will play a match with Stanley (or, as the greater includes the less, any other player in the United States) for $300 a side. Those anxious to learn further particulars can apply to the chess editor, who will give the readers of this column the desired information in the next issue, if the seal of privacy can be removed from his letter. . . .
The next issue, August 30, 1856, contained the following item:
CHESS CHALLENGE EXTR AORDINARY.—Mr. Ernest Morphy of Moscow, Claremount County, Ohio, a very strong player and one of the most masterly analysts in this or any other country, has written a private letter to a friend in this city, stating that he is desirous to get up a match, between the 1st and the 31st of January next at New Orleans, between his nephew, Paul Morphy, (as he writes, incontestably the superior of himself or Rousseau, and who now holds the scepter of chess in New Orleans), and Mr. Stanley or Marache (and we presume any other player in the country) for $300 a side—$100 to go to the loser (if Paul wins) to pay the expenses of the journey to New Orleans. Mr. James McConnell, attorney at law, New Orleans, or Paul Morphy himself, may be written to in regard to it. The proposition emanates from Mr. Ernest Morphy, who subscribes $50 towards the purse.