Paul Morphy: The Pride and Sorrow of Chess

by David Lawson

  New Orleans, Dec. 5, 1875

  My Dear Sir:

  It is unfortunately too true that Mr. Morphy’s mind has been deranged of late but not to the extent that the New York Sun would have us believe; for I fervently hope that the kind attention of his family will in time result in a complete cure. I noticed some time ago some extraordinary statements he made of petty persecutions directed against him by unknown persons, that there was something wrong about him, but after a while he openly accused some well known persons of being the authors of the persecutions, and insisted upon their giving him proper satisfaction by arms. Thus it is that the matter was noised about. Outside of the persecution question, he remains what his friends and acquaintances have always known him to be, the same highly educated and pleasing conversationalist.

  An attempt was made to induce him to remain in the “Louisiana Retreat,” an institution for the treatment of insane persons, but he objected and expounded to all concerned the law that governed his case and drew certain conclusions with such ir-refutable logic that his mother thought, and in my opinion very properly, that his case did not demand such extreme measures as depriving him of his liberty, and took him home.

  He has been very quiet of late and seems to have been impressed with the remark of some good friends about his “persecution mania.” I met him some days ago and the objectionable subject not having been broached, he was as rational and pleasant in his conversation as anybody else.

  Since somewhere about 1864 or 65 Mr. Morphy has had a certain aversion for chess. (Indeed he never was, strange as it will seem, an enthusiast.) This was caused, no doubt, by his being constantly bored to death by all sorts of persons who thought it a nice thing to play a game with the champion of the world, or to ask him in how many moves he could force mate in a game, or what was the best way to open the game, or to be kind enough to solve this or that problem &c, to say nothing of the mountains of stupid letters he was called upon to read. At that time he told me very frankly that he was going to abandon completely everything in the shape of public chess. But he consented to play with me as often as I should like. After this he went to Europe and on his return, observing that he played with me only to please me, I ceased to impose this species of penance on him. Our last games were in 1869 in the month of December.

  It is an error to suppose that Mr. Morphy is an idler. He is engaged upon no particular business, it is true, but he is fond of literature, an enlightened admirer of the fine arts, a great lover of books and he loves study. He is rather of sedentary habits (a great deal too much so), his tastes and habits are eminently refined, and his deportment is always gentlemanly; I may say aristocratic. He was a regular frequenter of opera, that is, when our city was right enough to support one, and he was able to appreciate the beauties of music and to understand and feel and profit by the elevating influences of the works of Mozart, Rossini and Meyerbeer and other great masters. I assure you, my dear sir, it will be a pity indeed if disease impairs permanently such a powerful brain, such a splendid mental organization, one so well stocked, too, with learning and varied information.

  Very truly yours, Charles A. Maurian

  It is evident from Maurian’s letter of December 5 that while Morphy had a persecution complex that sometimes reigned out of control, in general, he was his usual self; in fact, a strong but unsuccessful effort was made to get him to participate in the 1876 International Chess Congress at Philadelphia.

  Morphy’s fame had not dimmed. As a part of the First Centennial Celebration of the country, R. M. Devens had written Our First Century, in which he devoted one chapter to Paul Morphy as one of the “One Hundred Great and Memorable Events in the History of Our Country.”

  The persecution complex mentioned above seems not to have lasted very long for Maurian took issue with a paragraph in the New York Sun of April 24, 1877, and his letter in the Sun of May 2, 1877, indicates that Morphy had recovered his mental stability:

  New Orleans, April 28, 1877

  The Sun of the 24th inst. contains a repetition of that oft-told lie about the insanity of Paul Morphy—that he had not played chess for a long time, and so forth, ad nauseam. Will you have the kindness to publish the following, which contains all of the facts concerning Paul Morphy with which the public have anything to do?

  He is now practicing law in this city, and has never been insane, or spoken of in that relation by his family or friends.

  As to chess, he is unquestionably to-day the best chess player in the world, although he does not play often enough to keep himself in thorough practice. He gives the odds of a knight to our strongest players, and is seldom beaten, perhaps never when he cares to win.

  His disappearance from public view as a chess player has just this explanation—no more, no less.

  The publicity and lionizing which attached to him for a time, both in this country and Europe, were always distasteful to his family, and especially so to his mother.

  On his return from his European triumphs, he entered into an engagement with his mother never again to play for a money or other stake; never to play a public game or a game in a public place, and never again to encourage or countenance any publication of any sort whatever in connection with his name.

  This last clause in the agreement has heretofore been so strictly construed as to prevent any denial by him or his family of the numerous silly publications that have been made concerning him. It is now time, however, that the thing should be stopped.

  Will you have the kindness to inform the public at large, and newspaper paragraphers in particular, that Paul Morphy is engaged in a strict attendance upon his own affairs, and that his family and friends do not at present adjudge him in need of any assistance therein?

  Very respectfully, Chas. A. Maurian.

  Maurian indicates that Morphy was still playing chess in 1877. He also mentions Morphy’s “agreement” with his mother in 1859 “never again to encourage or countenance any publication of any sort whatever in connection with his name.” It would seem (judging from the many public activities Morphy subsequently engaged in with reference to chess) that this agreement was nothing more than a mutual understanding rather than a promise. For during his visits to Cuba in 1862 and 1864, Morphy’s chess games were hardly played in private and were immediately published in Cuba, Europe, and America, with attendant publicity. A large lithograph was published in El Moro Muza in October 1862, showing him playing the Cuban amateurs. He even resumed work with Rivière on their Openings treatise in 1863. None of this would have happened had Morphy expressed a desire that publicity be withheld.

  Apparently no promise to his mother was responsible for his abstention from public chess, contrary to what has often been contended. Even as late in his life as 1878, Morphy was being asked to participate in public chess. In the Philadelphia Sunday Times of June 30, 1889, Bird said, “We hoped to have him play in the Continental tournament of 1878, but were doomed to disappointment.” At this time, A. Rosenbaum of London was completing a painting of prominent English chess players, and he included a most delightful portrait of Paul Morphy as in his debonair days.

  About the beginning of 1879, Morphy developed symptoms of a mild form of illusion. Dr. L. P. Meredith, who visited New Orleans that year, reported his observations of Morphy in a letter dated April 16, 1879, in the Cincinnati Commercial. (The complete letter appears in the Appendix.)

  On the street in New Orleans, last month, I frequently saw Mr. Morphy, but I was longer in his presence, and had a better opportunity of studying him at the old Spanish Cathedral on Easter Sunday than elsewhere. He paid devout attention to the services, and appeared thoroughly familiar with all of the ceremonies, always assuming the kneeling posture, and moving his head and lips responsively at the right time, without apparently taking the cue from any of the worshipping throng. . . .

  I have spoken of his imagined salutations, and his pleasant bow and smile, and graceful wave of the hand, in response. This must have occurred twenty or th
irty times as he stood behind a massive column for a few minutes, in a position in which it was impossible for any one to see him from the direction in which he looked. In the speculations regarding his mental derangement it has been natural to attribute it in a great measure, to an over-exertion of brain power in his wonderful feats at chess, but nothing has ever been found to establish positively such a conclusion. His astonishing achievements appeared to cost him no effort. Analyses that would require weeks of laborious study on the part of the greatest masters, he would make as rapidly as his eyes could look over the squares. His eight or ten blindfold games, played simultaneously against strong players, appeared to require no more attention than the perusal of a book or paper. With rare exceptions, he appeared to know intuitively the strongest moves that could be made. His uncle, Ernest Morphy, during his visit to Cincinnati many years ago, told me how Paul, when a child, would suddenly drop his knife and fork at the table and set up on the checkered table-cloth a problem that had suddenly sprung into his head, using the cruets, salt-cellers and napkin-rings for pieces. I asked him if his nephew was remarkable for anything else than his peculiar aptitude for chess, and I recollect that he stated, among other things, that, after his return from a strange opera, he could hum or whistle it from beginning to end. . . .

  It is unquestionably an instance of a brain excessively developed at the expense of the physical man, having the mind expanded to the utmost bounds of sanity, and ready to wander outside its limits on the occurrence of some peculiarly exciting circumstance; and this happened, probably, in the sudden realization that what he had considered a competency was expended, and that he had become, for the present at least, dependent. After this he was in no condition to reason—to see that he had lived extravagantly while abroad and after his return, and that his expenditures were in excess of his share of his father’s estate. He imagined that he had been defrauded, intentionally or through mismanagement. . . .

  Gradually, Morphy’s imbalance advanced to a point where he occasionally believed that he was in great need and would approach a friend for a loan of $200. His condition was well understood, and his request was never refused, but upon being assured that the money was available he would feel relieved and invariably say he would call for it on the morrow, which he never did. One such occasion, reported in the Turf, Field and Farm of October 21, 1881, is of interest:

  On a recent occasion Mr. Morphy hastily entered the office of a well-known resident of New Orleans, and made known his need of two hundred dollars to save himself from impending disaster, and requested a loan of that amount. His friend resolved on an experiment which would test the relative strength of the hold upon Morphy’s mind of this delusion, and the other—his aversion to chess, and assuming a serious tone, he said: “You want this money very much, it seems.” “Yes,” said Morphy, “I must have it—it is absolutely necessary.” “Well,” replied the other, “I’ll tell you what I will do: if you will play a game of chess with me, I will make it two hundred and fifty dollars.” Morphy’s countenance betrayed the internal struggle between the conflicting emotions aroused by this offer. He paused, in thought, for some moments, and then in a tone expressive of his sense of the hardship inflicted upon him by the condition, and also, of a quiet exultation over the anticipated success of a plan he had formed, he accepted the terms; chess-board and men were produced in an inner office, and Morphy played his latest game of chess. With a disdainful curl of the lip, and a manifest repugnance, Morphy moved in such a way that his friend mated him in a very few moves, whereupon Morphy exclaimed, “There! I have done what you require: but the next time I play chess with you, I will give you the Queen!” and already oblivious of his pecuniary necessities, he was going away, when his friend reminded him that he was forgetting his reward. “I will come for it tomorrow!” was his reply, as he left the apartment.

  The necessity of a 200-dollar loan did not last very long, but Morphy still felt the need to be on his guard, as brought out by a young barber and published in the Turf, Field and Farm of April 22, 1881. It should be noted that the barber’s story was written by a reporter who probably exercised some license in describing Morphy’s condition, about which the papers were prone to exaggerate, as mentioned by Maurian:

  In a Broadway print shop a picture of Paul Morphy, the once famous monarch of chess players, is on view. It is a pastel drawing, with a good deal of life and vigor about it. The artist is Paul Schoeff, a barber, who recently came to this city from New Orleans to study art on his savings. To our reporter, Schoeff told a curious story of the original of his picture.

  “Mr. Morphy is crazy,” he said, “and lives with his mother and a servant. He is harmless, and no one ever has any trouble with him. His manias are very peculiar ones, and it is to one of them I owe my acquaintance with him. He is possessed of a belief that the barbers are in a vast conspiracy, suborned by his enemies, to cut his throat. There are only one or two shops in New Orleans he will enter, and when a strange barber, or even an old one, operates on him, he watches him closely, on the alert always for a suspicious movement. Often he springs from his chair and rushes into the street, half shaved, lathered and with his towel about his neck, screaming murder. Everybody knows and likes him, however, and though he is a nuisance they pity him too much to refuse to shave him.

  “You might wonder that he gets shaved at all, or at least does not shave himself, but here another of his manias comes in. He is a confirmed fop, and sometimes changes his clothes as often as a dozen times a day, each time going out for a walk, saluting all sorts of imaginary acquaintances as he trips along, and returning to get himself up over again. Of course he must be as immaculate in his hair-dressing as in that of his person, and nobody but a barber can do him justice.

  “I worked for a man named Schmidt, to whose shop Mr. Morphy used to come to get shaved. I was the boy of the shop, and was just learning to use the razor. One day Mr. Morphy came in, looked around and beckoned to me to shave him. The boss and the barbers winked at each other, as much as to say: ‘Well, he is crazy, sure enough,’ but no one interfered, for you must always let Mr. Morphy have his own way. Well, I lathered and shaved him, fortunately without a cut, though I was so excited at shaving a lunatic that it is a wonder I did not really cut his throat. From that time forth he never had any one else tend to him.

  “I was practicing drawing then, and the boss used to let me work in the back of the shop when there was nothing else to do. Mr. Morphy noticed my drawings, and one day, without a word, he sat down on a chair, pointed to himself and to my drawing board and nodded. I knew what he wanted, and went to work and made a picture of him. He sat to me every afternoon for a week. When the picture was done I presented it to him. Next day, when he came in, he gave me a little bundle. It contained a handsome silk handkerchief, a scarf and a fine scarf pin. Poor Mr. Morphy had given me his pet finery, for they were things he was very fond of wearing himself. The picture I brought on with me is one I drew from the first sketch of the old one, and it is a good deal the better of the two. I wear his presents with my Sunday suit.”

  Among all the reports on and letters about Morphy in his latter years, nowhere else is there any suggestion of his many daily changes of attire and nowhere else is it mentioned that he sometimes rushed into the street screaming. The same Turf, Field and Farm that published the above story about Morphy also published the following statement in his defense in its May 9, 1879, issue:

  Another base rumor that was amplified in print represented him as a silly fop, intoxicated with vanity, parading the fashionable streets of New Orleans, ogling the ladies, and impertinently saluting them with bows and grimaces. This report is false and cruel.

  Regina Morphy-Voitier, Paul’s niece, relates in The Life of Paul Morphy that he was “always neatly attired and never without his monocle and his small walking stick” for his afternoon walk on Canal Street, and she goes so far as to say that on those walks he gave “feminine charms an admiring glance, but later sometimes st
opped and stared.” She also mentions that sometimes, in his later years, he would walk on the verandah overlooking the garden declaiming in a low voice, “Il plantera la bannière de Castille sur les murs de Madrid au cri de ville gagnée, et le petit Roi s’en ira tout penaud.” (He will plant the banner of Castile upon the walls of Madrid, amidst the cries of the conquered city, and the little king will go away looking very sheepish.) The significance of this statement is obscure.

  Regina’s booklet conveys very little new information about Morphy, and much of it is inaccurate. She was a young girl during this period in Morphy’s life, and offers little firsthand knowledge of her subject.

  CHAPTER 24

  Psychoanalysts and Paul Morphy

  During the last years of his life, Morphy’s mental condition was marked by distrust, obsessions, and delusions, and his somewhat erratic behavior has attracted the attention of many in the psychiatric and psychoanalytic professions. In his time there were those who believed they could help him, but he would have no help, satisfied he needed none. Some believed that a return to chess would have stabilized him and relieved his tensions, but he would have none of it.

  The mental disorder which descended upon him, incidentally seeming to clear up in the last year or two of his life, during which he occupied himself with his reading, daily walks, and visits to his brother’s house, has been the subject of much psychoanalytic discussion. While some of the discussion of Morphy’s illness has been superficial, much of it has been serious and extensive, mainly that by Dr. Ernest Jones, the eminent English psy-choanalyst, who made a comprehensive study as reported in “The Problem of Paul Morphy,” published in the International Journal of Psycho-Analysis of June 1931. Dr. Reuben Fine also dealt with Morphy’s problem.*

  However, due to their sources, both were obliged to proceed on the basis of a good deal of misinformation. The many errors to be found in the booklet by C. A. Buck, Paul Morphy, His Later Life, have been noted in Chapter 16, nor is Regina Morphy-Voitier’s pamphlet free of them; and since both Jones and Fine relied upon these sources to some extent, this may have resulted in some ill-founded assumptions and conclusions.