Irish Gambit

Irish Gambit

a b c d e f g h 8 8 7 7 6 6 5 5 4 4 3 3 2 2 1 1 a b c d e f g h
Moves	1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Nxe5
ECO	C44
Origin	Columbia Chess Chronicle (July 16, 1887)
Parent	King's Knight Opening

The Irish Gambit is a chess opening that begins with the following moves:

1. e4 e5

2. Nf3 Nc6

3. Nxe5 ^[1]

Origin

The chess historian Edward Winter traced the origin of the Irish Gambit to an article published in the Columbia Chess Chronicle on July 16, 1887. The author of the article claims the gambit was invented by an Irishman named Dennis O'Flaherty. The article ends with these words:

Just before his demise he was asked to explain how he ever conceived this brilliant sacrifice. "Why," he said, "you old fool, I did not see that the Pawn was protected." ^[1]

The Oxford Companion to Chess contains a similar story about the origins of the gambit:

On his death bed the anonymous inventor was asked what subtlety lay behind his gambit (so the tale runs), and his last words were: 'I hadn't seen the king's pawn was defended.' ^[2]

In 2018, the writer Shawn Gillen published an autobiographical essay entitled The Irish Gambit. Gillen begins by presenting the Irish Gambit as an ethnic joke, ^[3] and goes on to compare the "[l]ogical thinking and the discipline required to play chess" to stereotypes of Irish people:

My father had also internalized some ethnic clichés about the Irish and it played into his rationale for playing chess. "We can talk and we can write," he would tell me, "and we are good at politics but there aren't any famous Irish philosophers, mathematicians, or chess players." ^[4]

Chicago Gambit

Chicago Gambit

a b c d e f g h 8 8 7 7 6 6 5 5 4 4 3 3 2 2 1 1 a b c d e f g h
Moves	1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Nxe5 Nxe5 4.d4
ECO	C44
Origin	Phillips vs. Pillsbury (January 7, 1899)
Named after	Chicago, United States
Parent	Irish Gambit

The Chicago Gambit is derived from the Irish Gambit. The Oxford Companion to Chess defines it as follows:

1. e4 e5

2. Nf3 Nc6

3. Nxe5 Nxe5

4. d4 ^[5]

A doctor named D. T. Phillips used the opening to defeat Harry Nelson Pillsbury in a simultaneous exhibition in Chicago on January 7, 1899. ^{[1] [6] [7]}

The Oxford Companion to Chess describes the Chicago Gambit as "unsound" and compares it unfavorably to the Müller–Schulze Gambit. ^[8]

See also

• List of chess openings
• List of chess openings named after places

References

1. Winter, Edward. "Unusual Chess Openings". Chesshistory.com. Archived from the original on September 4, 2022.
2. Hooper & Whyld (1992), p. 182.
3. Gillen (2018), pp. 9–10.
4. Gillen (2018), p. 15.
5. Hooper & Whyld (1992), p. 476.
6. Soltis, Andy (August 1997). "GM Follies" (PDF). Chess Life . pp. 12–13. Archived (PDF) from the original on December 7, 2024.
7. "D. T. Phillips vs. Harry Pillsbury". Chessgames.com . Chessgames Services LLC.
8. Hooper & Whyld (1992), pp. 76–77.

Sources

• Gillen, Shawn (2018). "The Irish Gambit". New Hibernia Review . 22 (2): 9–18. doi:10.1353/nhr.2018.0015. JSTOR   48670298.
• Hooper, David; Whyld, Kenneth (1992). The Oxford Companion to Chess (2nd ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN   0-19-866164-9.