Paul Morphy: The Pride and Sorrow of Chess

by David Lawson

  Others with whom Morphy passed many pleasant evenings were Mme. Regnault de Saint Jean D’Angély and the Baronne de L. The latter was famous for her soirées and her salon was the weekly resort of the most celebrated artists and writers of France. On one occasion she persuaded the famous baritone Graziani (recently taking lessons from Prèti) to play with Morphy at Queen odds by playfully promising that Mr. Morphy would sing a duo with him afterwards. Perhaps there was a grain of truth in what she said about Morphy in expressing her liking for him: “Because he is another lazy Creole like myself.”

  The Duke of Brunswick, with whom Morphy first dined on September 19, was a confirmed chess player, hardly to be seen otherwise than at chess. Edge says they were frequent visitors to the Duke’s box at the Italian Opera and even there the Duke played chess. On their first visit in October, they played chess throughout the entire performance of Norma. Edge mentions Morphy’s discomfiture when he was the Duke’s guest, since he was obliged to sit with his back to the stage, while facing the Duke and Count Isouard consulting against him.

  On the second of November they heard the Barber of Seville, during which Morphy played his most famous game, the Duke again consulting with Count Isouard. In his games with Morphy, the Duke always had a partner, sometimes two, Counts Isouard and Casabianca consulting against him.

  Count Casabianca gave a large soirée in Morphy’s honor on one of the former’s Friday “at home” days, October 29, at which many noblewomen and celebrated men were present. Morphy was introduced to all present as “The Napoleon of Chess.” A number of Morphy’s consultation games with the Duke of Brunswick, Count Isouard, and Count Casabianca took place on these “at home” days.

  On other occasions he was entertained at Prince Murat’s chateau, where the Princess would sometimes be joined by Count Casabianca in games against him.

  Morphy sometimes declined invitations when he thought he would be expected to play chess, although very rarely did chess-playing interfere with his evening. On February 14 (as published in the New Orleans Sunday Delta, March 27, 1859), at a fête given

  by the Duke Decazes . . . [Morphy] played two games blindfold against M. Prefect Lacoste and General Busserolles, both fine players, winning both. The moves were transmitted by Mr. Lequesne . . . and during the whole of the performance, Mr. Morphy sustained an animated conversation with Mme Decazes and several ladies and gentlemen.

  As Edge recalled, one evening at the hotel, as Morphy and he sat talking (they had adjoining rooms), a stranger announced himself:

  “I am Prince Galitzin; I wish to see Mr. Morphy.” Morphy looked up from an armchair and replied, “I am he.” The Prince answered, “It is not possible! you’re too young,” and then he seated himself by Morphy’s side and told him, “I first heard of your wonderful deeds on the frontiers of Siberia. One of my suite had a copy of the chess paper published in Berlin, the Schachzeitung, and ever since that time I have been wanting to see you.” And he told our hero that he must pay a visit to St. Petersburg; for the chess club in the Imperial Palace would receive him with enthusiasm.

  Among the first to recognize Morphy’s significance in the chess arena was Eugène Lequesne, the well-known French sculptor. Morphy had been in France less than two weeks when Lequesne asked him to sit for his bust in marble. Morphy obliged with a first sitting on September 15. The bust was exhibited at the Exposition des Beaux Arts in 1859. Maurian mentions in the New Orleans Sunday Delta of February 6, 1859, that small replicas (three-fifths the actual size) had arrived in New Orleans by January 1859, and described the bust as “a perfect likeness.” It received special attention the day before Morphy left Paris some months later. Lequesne also took a plaster cast of Morphy’s right hand, now possessed by the author.*

  About the first of November, Edge received a letter from Lowenthal asking information about one of the blindfold games Morphy had played at Birmingham. The Reverend George Salmon had taken board two against Morphy, and the game had gone to forty-nine moves, but since the score had not been clear, Staunton had published only the first twenty-four moves. As Edge remarked:

  Herr Lowenthal wrote me to request that I would forward him the remaining moves, as there was a desire to have the partie complete. It was nearly midnight, and Morphy had gone into his bedroom after dictating me some games played during the day, and, mindful of Herr Lowenthal’s request, I called to him, asking whether he was coming back, when he replied that he was already in bed. I said I should be obliged if he would let me bring him a board and light, in order that he might dictate me the required moves, when he answered, “There’s no necessity for that: read me over what Staunton published, and I’ll give you the remainder.” He called over the omitted moves as fast as I could write them down.

  The American Minister (Ambassador) to France, the Honorable Mr. Mason, took a great interest in Morphy and was frequently to be seen sitting at the board when Morphy was playing. He was one of those present at Morphy’s Paris blindfold exhibition. Edge wrote to Fiske on November 12 that the Minister “has requested permission to introduce Morphy to the Emperor, who has the reputation of being a very tolerable knight player.”

  It seems that something of Ambassador Mason’s plans for Morphy had become known to New York papers before Edge wrote, for Porter’s Spirit of the Times of November 6, 1858, had the following announcement:

  The fame of the youthful chess champion of the New World has penetrated the Imperial cloisters of the Tuileries, and his Majesty, Napoleon III, has invited Mr. Morphy to give a specimen of his blindfold playing before the Empress and ladies of her court. His Imperial Majesty desires himself to engage Mr. Morphy in a game, and, in acknowledgment of the pre-emi-nence of the young American sovereign with whom he will thus contend, he has consented to try to equalize his chances, by the acceptance of a Rook at the commencement of the game.

  Twelve days later, on November 18, Edge wrote the following letter to Fiske:

  1 Rue du Dauphin; Paris

  18th November 1858

  My dear Fiske.

  Will you have the goodness to forward the following immediately to Mons. Jean Prèti

  Café de la Régence

  Paris

  2 Complete sets of the Chess Monthly for 1858.

  [The next paragraph concerns subscriptions.]

  There is nothing new. Morphy stays until Spring, and Anderssen comes here to play a match on 18th Dec. The universal stated opinion of all Europe now is, that Morphy is superior not merely to all living players, but to Labourdonnais etc. even. At the Régence, the old friends of Labourdonnais openly declare this; they say that P.M. is equally brilliant and much more solide, and that he has reduced chess to “une science exacte.” You will recollect that Paulsen said the same thing last year.

  Morphy has this week announced publicly that he will play none in France even except Harrwitz; but Harrwitz has had too much already. The statement in last Illustrated London News that Harrwitz was about to challenge Morphy to another contest is a lie. Harrwitz won’t even play an off-hand game. Fancy Morphy giving all France Pawn and move.

  The American Ambassador has become a warm friend of Morphy’s and without his knowledge, has proposed and got him elected a member of the Cercle Imperial, to which only the Emperor, Princes Imperials, the highest noblesse, ministers and foreign ambassadors belong. Morphy was received by them with most distinguished honor. Mr. Mason is going also to present him to the Emperor. “Honors crowd thick upon him,” but they do not affect him.

  Why do you not write us an epistle, and tell us about the N.Y. Club, Thompson, Mead[,] etc.? You ought to, and Morphy is expecting it of you.

  I remain

  Yours most truly

  Fred. M. Edge

  P.S. Address as above, but write soon.

  Edge studiously avoids mention of the above matter about the Emperor in his book. Undoubtedly Morphy prohibited it, wishing to avoid any suggestion that he had “cashed in” prestigewise on a meeting with Napoleon III
, a meeting he would have considered a very personal honor. Edge’s only mention of Ambassador Mason in his book is that “the Hon. Mr. Mason took a warm interest in his countryman.”

  But for Edge’s letters, nothing would have been known about the American Minister’s requesting permission to present Morphy to the Emperor and his being received by members of the Cercle Impérial. Some news leaked into American papers, such as the New Orleans Sunday Delta, Porter’s Spirit, etc., before Maurian and Fiske realized that Morphy wanted no publicity. However, the news that Morphy had been elected a member of the Cercle Impérial never became public. Even Fiske never mentioned it.

  It is most likely that Morphy was received by the Emperor, even though there was no public announcement. Napoleon III had some interest in chess, as evidenced by his donation of a valuable Sèvres vase as a trophy to the First Prize winner of the 1867 Tournament, held in Paris. This tournament was won by Ignatz Kolisch, who later sought to arrange a match with Morphy. Harrwitz had been privileged to play before Prince Napoleon the year before, as reported in the New York Tribune of October 12, 1857, and most certainly Morphy constituted a far greater attraction to the court.

  Morphy had played with everyone at La Régence, regardless of their strength, and had admittedly outclassed them all. Edge says he now began to show

  an antipathy to chess, and I experienced the greatest difficulty in inducing him to go to the Régence at all. When I would ask him at breakfast what he was going to do with himself during the day, his immediate reply would be, “I am not going to the Régence.”

  Perhaps in addition to being bored with chess, Morphy was also physically unwell. Edge says he had “been an invalid since his arrival in the French capital,” and that “nothing proves so satisfactorily . . . Morphy’s wondrous powers in chess, as his contests in France, laboring as he constantly did, under positive bodily suffering.”

  FOOTNOTE

  ______________

  * EDITOR’S NOTE: How Lawson came into the possession of the Lequesne sculpture is unknown, but, op cit page 18, his collection was sold in 1978 to chess publisher Dale Brandreth.

  CHAPTER 13

  “Morphy Won’t Let Me”

  When Morphy realized that the Staunton match was out of the question, the possibility of a match with Adolf Anderssen began to loom large in his mind. Unaware that plans for the Staunton match had been aborted, Fiske published the following announcement in the October 1858 Chess Monthly:

  Mr. Morphy will, most likely, go to Breslau and play him [Anderssen] a long match of twenty-one games. Staunton has formally accepted Mr. Morphy’s challenge for five-hundred pounds. The contest is expected to commence the first week in November.

  It is clear that Morphy had expected to go to Germany. Edge, in a letter to Fiske dated September 16, 1858, wrote: “After beating Harrwitz (St. Amant will not play) we shall go on to Berlin and Breslau. Anderssen, Lange and Mayet have got to bite the dust.” Even as late as February 1859, Fiske noted in the Chess Monthly that

  Mr. Morphy hopes, before returning to this country, to have the pleasure of contending against Mr. Max Lange, the well-known player and critic, who now presides with so much ability over the pages of the venerable Schachzeitung of Berlin. Should he meet with the same success against Mr. Lange, that has heretofore attended him in the Old World he will, doubtless, publish a challenge to all Europe, proffering to any player the odds of Pawn and move.

  Thoughts of a match with Anderssen had begun to take shape in early October, if not before, but confusion was added by the most unfortunate Staunton affair, which dragged on even after Morphy’s October correspondence with Staunton and Lord Lyttelton. Such was Morphy’s distraction that Edge mentions that the amateurs of La Régence, through Rivière, wrote to Anderssen, inviting him to come to Paris for a match with Morphy, who had told them he did not feel well enough for the trip to Breslau. Morphy also addressed the following letter to the Breslau Chess Club:

  Hotel Breteuil, October 8, 1858

  The Secretary

  Breslau Chess Club

  Dear Sir,

  I have received lately two letters, one from the Chess Club of Leipsic, and the other from Breslau, inviting me to their cities in order to engage in a match with Mr. Anderssen. It is not possible to accept these propositions, but I wish to give you from the amateurs of the Régence the 295 francs that have remained from my parties with Mr. Harrwitz to help defray the cost of travel for Mr. Anderssen in accepting the invitation to Paris.

  Please accept the assurance of my high regard.

  Paul Morphy

  Anderssen replied at once that it would be impossible for him to leave Breslau before mid-December, during his vacation. Dr. Schutze, secretary of the Brelsau Chess Club, also wrote on behalf of Anderssen, offering in turn to have the match in Breslau for a stake of fifty pounds, and an additional twenty-five pounds to be set aside for Morphy’s travel expenses. The latter offer Morphy refused:

  Hotel Breteuil, Oct. 14, 1858

  Dr. Schutze, Secretary

  Breslau Chess Club

  Dear Sir,

  I regret that you do not understand my position: I have never and never will play as a professional and I am in a position that allows me to travel at my own expense. The offer you have made is very kind but should not be addressed to me.

  It will not be possible for me to go to Breslau to contest with Mr. Anderssen. I had hoped he could accept the invitation of the French players, but the dispatch received Saturday deprives me of hope that I will be able to measure myself with the German champion.

  Please accept assurance of my high regards.

  Paul Morphy

  And so it appeared there would be no Morphy–Anderssen match, because Morphy, on hearing that Anderssen could not make the trip to Paris before December, said, as Edge quotes him, “that he should be deprived of the pleasure of crossing swords with the victor in the International Tournament [1851], inasmuch as he must be at home before Christmas.” He was much more concerned about getting home than he was about meeting Anderssen. This suggests that his interest in chess was limited, for Anderssen’s name was the greatest in European chess, and surely a match with Anderssen would have meant much to Morphy’s worldwide chess standing. As Edge said:

  His voyage to Europe was useless, if he did not play Anderssen. All was of no effect. Morphy did not appear to have the slightest ambition, say what I would to him. He “must be at home in December; he had promised to be there, and home he would go.”

  Thinking only of Morphy and how much it would mean to him and his place in chess history, Edge determined to bring Morphy and Anderssen together. He quietly set to work, writing to the leading chess clubs of Europe and principal amateurs, telling of Morphy’s decision to return home before he could engage Anderssen, hoping to enlist their support in encouraging Morphy to remain longer.

  The following letter was sent to the Breslau Chess Club, reprinted from E. Falkbeer’s Paul Morphy. Other letters by Edge to chess clubs and amateurs were similar:

  Hotel Breteuil, Oct. 30, 1858

  Breslau Chess Club

  Dr. Schutze

  Dear Sir:

  You have heard without doubt, with regret that the fine American chess player Mr. Paul Morphy is ready at this time to leave Europe in about fifteen days and also that he is not likely to return for several years. Nothing could be worse for all true chess amateurs; but although several strong players are willing to come to Paris to measure with him their strength, the early departure of Mr. Morphy will deprive us of great games that would be played between him and these illustrious champions. Mr. Morphy is the first to truly regret the obligations calling him to return to the Untied States and would prefer I am sure, to pass the winter in Europe. But he fears the dissatisfaction of his family with a too long prolongation of his sojourn with us.

  In this matter all the chess amateurs of Paris have decided to write to him one letter to get him to stay in the interest of Chess. Also severa
l clubs of London and Paris are themselves following the same example and are themselves writing to him in the same way. And if your circle would address him during this week (!) it would without doubt show Mr. Morphy that it is the unanimous wish that he stay longer and serve to present to his family the reason why Mr. Morphy should delay his departure. I have had the pleasure of traveling with Mr. Morphy since his arrival in Europe and I am convinced that he would yield to such an important and unanimous wish.

  With high regards, &c.

  Fred. M. Edge

  Europe was interested in a Morphy–Anderssen match much more than it had been in the Morphy–Staunton encounter, and soon Morphy received letters urging that he meet Anderssen. Anderssen himself wrote to Morphy saying, “he did not think it possible he could leave without playing him.”

  Morphy still insisted that he must leave, but when requests from his friends were also reinforced by his doctor’s statement that in his condition he should not risk a winter crossing of the Atlantic (Edge sent the doctor’s certificate on to the family in New Orleans), Morphy capitulated and agreed to pass the winter in Paris. Edge then sent the following letter:

  Hotel Breteuil, Nov. 17, 1858

  Breslau Chess Club

  Dr. Schutze, Secretary

  Sir,

  I have the honor to inform you that Mr. Paul Morphy has at last given in to the pressing solicitations of European chess circles and has resolved to pass the winter in Europe. He has expressed the hope that the match between Mr. Anderssen and himself will take place in Paris about the middle of next month and he has promised to have the pleasure of writing to your celebrated champion by to-morrow’s post.

  Please receive my regards