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🏆 3rd American Chess Congress (1874)

Chessgames.com Chess Event Description
The 3rd American Chess Congress was held in Chicago, Illinois from July 7th to the 16th, 1874. Eight US players participated in the double rounds event by paying an entry fee of $20. The participants were previous congress winner George Henry Mackenzie, previous congress participants Frederic Elder, Henry Hosmer, Max Judd, Hiram Kennicott and Frederick Perrin, and newcomers Frederick Bock and James Adams Congdon. The time control was 15 moves every hour. For the first time in an organized US tournament draw ... [more]

Player: Hiram Kennicott

 page 1 of 1; 4 games  PGN Download 
Game  ResultMoves YearEvent/LocaleOpening
1. H Kennicott vs H Hosmer  0-13218743rd American Chess CongressB20 Sicilian
2. H Hosmer vs H Kennicott 1-02918743rd American Chess CongressC61 Ruy Lopez, Bird's Defense
3. Mackenzie vs H Kennicott  1-05018743rd American Chess CongressC28 Vienna Game
4. H Kennicott vs Mackenzie  0-14518743rd American Chess CongressC53 Giuoco Piano
  REFINE SEARCH:   White wins (1-0) | Black wins (0-1) | Draws (1/2-1/2) | Kennicott wins | Kennicott loses  


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Kibitzer's Corner
Sep-22-13
Premium Chessgames Member		  FSR: One rarely sees such a high proportion of Fredericks in a tournament.
Mar-07-16
Premium Chessgames Member		  zanzibar: <FSR> or in the comments.

(It was 100%, afraid I've just cut it in half!)

* * * * *

The missing games aren't missing at all, they're forfeits, as explained on the bottom of page 98 of the 5th American Chess Congress tournament book (which does a retrospective review of previous Chess Congresses, and so is the defacto tournament book for both the 3rd and 4th Congresses).

<Mr. Bock, who had been playing under the disadvantages attending ill-health, resigned his two games to Mr. Hosmer, and on the last day of the tournament General Congdon resigned his games to Captain Mackenzie. By cancelling the games played by Messrs. Kennicott and Elder, and computing the drawn games as half a won game to each contestant producing a drawn battle, the final score appears as follows:

Geo. H. Mackenzie, won 8.5 games.
Henry Hosmer, " 8 "
Max Judd, " 7 "
Frederick Bock, " 4 "
J. A. Congdon, " 1.5 "
Frederick Perrin, " 1 "

(p99/122)
>

The rules stated that any player who dropped out before completing 2/3 of their schedule would have their results nullified.

Thus, the 3rd Congress only had six players, officially.

One more aside. The tournament book reports that the <London (1862)> rules were used. This isn't true in one important respect - the players alternated colors in the RR even if a game were drawn in a pairing match.

Mar-07-16
Premium Chessgames Member		  zanzibar: Here's the complete list of prizes awarded for the main tournament:

<

George H. Mackenzie ... First Prize ... $225.00
Henry Hosmer ... ... ... Second Prize ... 150.00
Max Judd ... ... ... ... Third Prize ... 75.00

>

Wish <CG> preserved the formatting.

Mar-07-16
Premium Chessgames Member		  zanzibar: The full rules were spelled out in Brownson's <Chess Journal v59-69 (1875)> in the beginning of the journal.

The distinction begin a draw and a nullified game is mentioned as concerns colors.

(I'm wondering what the primary source of the games is, as the 5th Congress Book has none of the actual games).

Mar-07-16
Premium Chessgames Member		  zanzibar: So there was a tournament book specific to the Congress issued:

http://www.crumiller.com/chess/ches...

but it's unavailable on google books. Lyons lists it as the "scarcest of the American Chess Congress Books".

Mar-07-16
Premium Chessgames Member		  zanzibar: Again, we have a tournament where journal/newspaper coverage of the games was deliberately limited by the organizers - in an attempt to focus interest on the tournament book.

The Westminster Papers (v7 1875) went so far as to comment on this (I guess partly from the experience with London (1860) and Birmingham (1858)):

<The Chicago Committee have resolved to publish the games after the tourney in Book form. We can assure them that, in our judgment, this is not wise policy. The games should be published at once, and whilst the players are interested in the subject. We believe that those games of the Baden Tourney and the Vienna Tourney that were published by us as quickly as we could get them were more played over than all the games that have been published since. The games of the last tourney are still being published in the Continental Chess papers, but we never see any one playing over the games, nor do we see them quoted in this Country, Australia or America. (p62)

...

We can only repeat that when the book is published no one will read it, except those who have to do so as a matter of business; whereas, if the games had been sent to the journals at once, the whole of them would have been played over by the end of next month. (p82)>

Apr-20-16  Erkostic: I just posted on my blog, how two Chicago Newspapers covered the congress, part one can be found here.

http://chessreader.blogspot.com/201...

Part two to follow.

Apr-30-16  Erkostic: Part two of my blog post on the congress

http://chessreader.blogspot.com/201...

Apr-30-16
Premium Chessgames Member		  Calli: I have the OLMS reprint of the tournament book and can lookup any details if you wish.
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