Harry Nelson Pillsbury (December 5, 1872 – June 17, 1906) was an American
chess
Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to disti ...
player. At the age of 22, he won one of the strongest tournaments of the time (winning the
Hastings 1895 chess tournament
The Hastings 1895 chess tournament was a round-robin tournament of chess conducted at the Brassey Institute in Hastings, England from 5 August to 2 September 1895.
Hastings 1895 was arguably the strongest tournament in history at the time it occu ...
), but his illness and early death prevented him from challenging for the
World Chess Championship
The World Chess Championship is played to determine the world champion in chess. The current world champion is Magnus Carlsen of Norway, who has held the title since 2013.
The first event recognized as a world championship was the World Chess ...
.
Biography
Early life
Pillsbury was born in
Somerville, Massachusetts
Somerville ( ) is a city located directly to the northwest of Boston, and north of Cambridge, Massachusetts, Cambridge, in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As of the 2020 United States Census, the city had a total population of 81, ...
, in 1872 and moved to New York City in 1894, then to
Philadelphia
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...
in 1898.
By 1890, having only played chess for two years, he beat noted expert H. N. Stone. In April 1892, Pillsbury won a match two games to one against World Champion
Wilhelm Steinitz
William Steinitz (born Wilhelm Steinitz; May 14, 1836 – August 12, 1900) was an Austrian and, later, American chess player. From 1886 to 1894, he was the first official World Chess Champion. He was also a highly influential writer and che ...
, who gave him
odds
Odds provide a measure of the likelihood of a particular outcome. They are calculated as the ratio of the number of events that produce that outcome to the number that do not. Odds are commonly used in gambling and statistics.
Odds also have ...
of a
pawn
Pawn most often refers to:
* Pawn (chess), the weakest and most numerous piece in the game
* Pawnbroker or pawnshop, a business that provides loans by taking personal property as collateral
Pawn may also refer to:
Places
* Pawn, Oregon, an his ...
. Pillsbury's rise was meteoric, and there was soon no one to challenge him in the New York chess scene.
Hastings 1895
![Harrynelsonpillsbury](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1b/Harrynelsonpillsbury.jpg)
The
Brooklyn
Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
chess club sponsored his journey to Europe to play in the
Hastings 1895 chess tournament
The Hastings 1895 chess tournament was a round-robin tournament of chess conducted at the Brassey Institute in Hastings, England from 5 August to 2 September 1895.
Hastings 1895 was arguably the strongest tournament in history at the time it occu ...
, in which all the greatest players of the time participated. The 22-year-old Pillsbury became a celebrity in the United States and abroad by winning the tournament, finishing ahead of reigning world champion
Emanuel Lasker
Emanuel Lasker (; December 24, 1868 – January 11, 1941) was a German chess player, mathematician, and philosopher who was World Chess Champion for 27 years, from 1894 to 1921, the longest reign of any officially recognised World Chess Champ ...
, former world champion
Wilhelm Steinitz
William Steinitz (born Wilhelm Steinitz; May 14, 1836 – August 12, 1900) was an Austrian and, later, American chess player. From 1886 to 1894, he was the first official World Chess Champion. He was also a highly influential writer and che ...
, recent challengers
Mikhail Chigorin
Mikhail Ivanovich Chigorin (also ''Tchigorin''; russian: Михаи́л Ива́нович Чиго́рин; – ) was a Russian chess player. He played two World Championship matches against Wilhelm Steinitz, losing both times. The last great ...
and
Isidor Gunsberg
Isidore ( ; also spelled Isador, Isadore and Isidor) is an English and French masculine given name. The name is derived from the Greek name ''Isídōros'' (Ἰσίδωρος) and can literally be translated to "gift of Isis." The name has survived ...
, and future challengers
Siegbert Tarrasch
Siegbert Tarrasch (; 5 March 1862 – 17 February 1934) was a German chess player, considered to have been among the strongest players and most influential theoreticians of the late 19th and early 20th century.
Life
Tarrasch was born in Bresla ...
,
Carl Schlechter
Carl Schlechter (2 March 1874 – 27 December 1918) was a leading Austro-Hungarian chess master and theoretician at the turn of the 20th century. He is best known for drawing a World Chess Championship match with Emanuel Lasker.
Early life
Sc ...
and
Dawid Janowski
Dawid Markelowicz Janowski (25 May 1868 – 15 January 1927; often spelled ''David'') was a Polish-born French chess player. The Janowski variations of the Old Indian Defense and of the Queen's Gambit Declined are named after him.
Biography
B ...
.
The dynamic style that Pillsbury exhibited during the tournament also helped to popularize the
Queen's Gambit
The Queen's Gambit is the chess opening that starts with the moves:
:1. d4 d5
:2. c4
It is one of the oldest openings and is still commonly played today. It is traditionally described as a ''gambit'' because White appears to sacrifice the ...
during the 1890s, including his famous win over Siegbert Tarrasch.
St. Petersburg 1895
His next major tournament was the
Saint Petersburg 1895-96 chess tournament, a six-round
round-robin tournament
A round-robin tournament (or all-go-away-tournament) is a competition
Competition is a rivalry where two or more parties strive for a common goal which cannot be shared: where one's gain is the other's loss (an example of which is a zero ...
between four of the top five finishers at Hastings (Pillsbury, Chigorin, Lasker and Steinitz; Tarrasch did not play). Pillsbury appears to have contracted
syphilis
Syphilis () is a sexually transmitted infection caused by the bacterium ''Treponema pallidum'' subspecies ''pallidum''. The signs and symptoms of syphilis vary depending in which of the four stages it presents (primary, secondary, latent, an ...
prior to the start of the event. Although he was in the lead after the first half of the tournament (Pillsbury 6 points out of 9, Lasker 5, Steinitz 4, Chigorin 1), he was affected by severe headaches and scored only 1 out of 9 in the second half, ultimately finishing third (Lasker out of 18, Steinitz 9, Pillsbury 8, Chigorin 7). He lost a critical fourth cycle encounter to Lasker, and
Garry Kasparov
Garry Kimovich Kasparov (born 13 April 1963) is a Russian chess grandmaster, former World Chess Champion, writer, political activist and commentator. His peak rating of 2851, achieved in 1999, was the highest recorded until being surpassed by ...
has suggested that had he won, he could well have won the tournament and forced a world championship match against Lasker.
U.S. Champion 1897
In spite of his ill health, Pillsbury beat American champion
Jackson Showalter
Jackson Whipps Showalter (February 5, 1859 in Minerva, Kentucky – February 5, 1935 in Lexington, Kentucky) was a five-time U.S. Chess Champion: 1890, 1892, 1892–1894, 1895–96 and 1906–1909.
Chess career
U.S. Championship matches
Showalt ...
in 1897 to win the
U.S. Chess Championship, a title he held until his death in 1906.
Decline and death
Poor mental and physical health, the result of a syphilis infection, prevented him from realizing his full potential throughout the rest of his life. He succumbed to the illness in a Philadelphia hospital in 1906. Pillsbury is buried in Laurel Hill Cemetery in
Reading, Massachusetts
Reading ( ) is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, north of central Boston. The population was 25,518 at the 2020 census.
History
Settlement and American independence
Many of the Massachusetts Bay Colony's original settler ...
.
Lifetime records
Pillsbury had an even record against Lasker (+5−5=4), a feat matched or surpassed by few. He even beat Lasker with the black pieces at
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
in 1895 and at
Augsburg
Augsburg (; bar , Augschburg , links=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swabian_German , label=Swabian German, , ) is a city in Swabia, Bavaria, Germany, around west of Bavarian capital Munich. It is a university town and regional seat of the ' ...
in 1900 (this was an , however, not a tournament game):
:Emanuel Lasker vs. Pillsbury, Augsburg 1900
1.e4 e5 2.f4 d5 3.exd5 e4 4.Nc3 Nf6 5.Qe2 Bd6 6.d3 0-0 7.dxe4 Nxe4 8.Nxe4 Re8 9.Bd2 Bf5 10.0-0-0 Bxe4 11.Qg4 f5 12.Qg3 Nd7 13.Bc3 Nf6 14.Nh3 Ng4 15.Be2 Be7 16.Bxg4 (''diagram'') Bh4 17.Bxf5 Bxg3 18.Be6+ Rxe6 19.dxe6 Qe8 20.hxg3 Bxg2 21.Rhe1 Bxh3 22.Rd7 Qg6 23.b3 Re8 24.Re5 Bxe6 25.Rxc7 Qxg3 26.Kb2 h6 27.Rxb7 Rc8 28.Bd4 Qg2 29.Rxa7 Rxc2+ 30.Kb1 Qd2
Pillsbury also had an even score against Steinitz (+5−5=3), but a slight minus against Chigorin (+7−8=6), Tarrasch (+5−6=2) and against
Joseph Henry Blackburne
Joseph Henry Blackburne (10 December 1841 – 1 September 1924) was a British chess player. Nicknamed "The Black Death", he dominated the British scene during the latter part of the 19th century. Blackburne learned the game at the relatively late ...
(+3−5=4), while he beat
David Janowski
Dawid Markelowicz Janowski (25 May 1868 – 15 January 1927; often spelled ''David'') was a Polish-born French chess player. The Janowski variations of the Old Indian Defense and of the Queen's Gambit Declined are named after him.
Biography
B ...
(+6−4=2) and
Géza Maróczy
Géza Maróczy (; 3 March 1870 – 29 May 1951) was a Hungarian chess player, one of the leading players in the world in his time. He was one of the inaugural recipients of the title International Grandmaster from FIDE in 1950.
Early career
G ...
(+4−3=7) and had a significant edge over
Carl Schlechter
Carl Schlechter (2 March 1874 – 27 December 1918) was a leading Austro-Hungarian chess master and theoretician at the turn of the 20th century. He is best known for drawing a World Chess Championship match with Emanuel Lasker.
Early life
Sc ...
(+8−2=9).
Blindfold skill
Pillsbury was a very strong
blindfold chess
Blindfold chess, also known as ''sans voir'', is a form of chess play wherein the players do not see the positions of the pieces and do not touch them. This forces players to maintain a mental model of the positions of the pieces. Moves are commu ...
player, and could play
checkers
Checkers (American English), also known as draughts (; British English), is a group of strategy board games for two players which involve diagonal moves of uniform game pieces and mandatory captures by jumping over opponent pieces. Checkers ...
and
chess
Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to disti ...
simultaneously while playing a hand of
whist
Whist is a classic English trick-taking card game which was widely played in the 18th and 19th centuries. Although the rules are simple, there is scope for strategic play.
History
Whist is a descendant of the 16th-century game of ''trump'' ...
, and reciting a list of long words. His maximum was 22 simultaneous blindfold games at
Moscow
Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...
1902. However, his greatest feat was 21 simultaneous games against the players in the
Hannover
Hanover (; german: Hannover ; nds, Hannober) is the capital and largest city of the German States of Germany, state of Lower Saxony. Its 535,932 (2021) inhabitants make it the List of cities in Germany by population, 13th-largest city in Germa ...
Hauptturnier of 1902—the winner of the Hauptturnier would be recognized as a master, yet Pillsbury scored +3−7=11. As a teenager,
Edward Lasker
Edward Lasker (born Eduard Lasker) (December 3, 1885 – March 25, 1981) was a German-American chess and Go player. He was awarded the title of International Master of chess by FIDE. Lasker was an engineer by profession, and an author of ...
played Pillsbury in a blindfold exhibition in
Breslau, against the wishes of his mother, and recalled in ''Chess Secrets I learned from the Masters'':
But it soon became evident that I would have lost my game even if I had been in the calmest of moods. Pillsbury gave a marvellous performance, winning 13 of the 16 blindfold games, drawing two, and losing only one. He played strong chess and made no mistakes resumably in recalling the positions The picture of Pillsbury sitting calmly in an armchair, with his back to the players, smoking one cigar after another, and replying to his opponents' moves after brief consideration in a clear, unhesitating manner, came back to my mind 30 years later, when I refereed Alekhine's world record performance at the Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name ...
World's Fair
A world's fair, also known as a universal exhibition or an expo, is a large international exhibition designed to showcase the achievements of nations. These exhibitions vary in character and are held in different parts of the world at a specif ...
, where he played 32 blindfold games simultaneously. It was quite an astounding demonstration, but Alekhine made quite a number of mistakes, and his performance did not impress me half as much as Pillsbury's in Breslau.
Memorization skills
Before his simultaneous chess exhibitions, Pillsbury would entertain his audience with feats of memory that involved accurately recalling long lists of words after hearing or looking at them just once. One such list, which Pillsbury repeated forward and backward, performing the same feat the next day, was:
Antiphlogistine, periosteum, takadiastase, plasmon, ambrosia, Threlkeld, streptococcus, staphylococcus, micrococcus, plasmodium, Mississippi, Freiheit, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, athletics, no war, Etchenberg, American, Russian, philosophy, Piet Potgelter's Rost, Salamagundi, Oomisillecootsi, Bangmamvate, Schlechter's Nek, Manzinyama, theosophy, catechism, Madjesoomalops
Irving Chernev and Fred Reinfeld, in the ''Fireside Book of Chess'', state that this list was devised by H. Threkeld-Edwards, a surgeon, and Prof. Mansfield Merriman, teacher of civil engineering at Lehigh University, Bethlehem, PA, who challenged Pillsbury in Philadelphia, PA, before an exhibition in 1896. (Other sources cite the location of the challenge as London, UK.)
References
Further reading
*
*
External links
*
*
Edward WinterPillsbury's Torment(2002, updated 2005)
*
Edward WinterHarry Nelson Pillsbury
The Boston Globe article
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pillsbury, Henry
1872 births
1906 deaths
Deaths from syphilis
American chess players
People from Somerville, Massachusetts
19th-century chess players
20th-century chess players