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Samuel Boden
S Boden 
Credit: Westminster Papers, September 1876 

Number of games in database: 136
Years covered: 1847 to 1877
Overall record: +72 -26 =11 (71.1%)*
   * Overall winning percentage = (wins+draws/2) / total games in the database. 27 exhibition games, blitz/rapid, odds games, etc. are excluded from this statistic.

MOST PLAYED OPENINGS
With the White pieces:
 Ruy Lopez (7) 
    C61 C78 C68 C60 C65
 Bishop's Opening (5) 
    C24 C23
 Two Knights (5) 
    C57 C55 C58
 Uncommon Opening (5) 
    B00 A00
 Philidor's Defense (5) 
    C41
 Vienna Opening (4) 
    C27 C29
With the Black pieces:
 Philidor's Defense (12) 
    C41
 King's Gambit Declined (9) 
    C30
 Ruy Lopez (7) 
    C64 C74 C84 C77
 Evans Gambit (7) 
    C51 C52
 King's Pawn Game (7) 
    C44 C40
 Bishop's Opening (5) 
    C23
Repertoire Explorer

NOTABLE GAMES: [what is this?]
   R Schulder vs S Boden, 1853 0-1
   G MacDonnell vs S Boden, 1869 0-1
   S Boden vs J Owen, 1858 1-0
   S Boden vs Bird, 1869 1-0
   S Boden vs A Belaieff, 1867 1-0
   J Owen vs S Boden, 1857 0-1
   S Boden vs J Owen, 1858 1-0
   S Boden vs J Owen, 1858 1-0
   S Boden vs Morphy, 1858 1-0
   S Boden vs Morphy, 1858 1/2-1/2

NOTABLE TOURNAMENTS: [what is this?]
   Provincial Tournament, London (1851)

GAME COLLECTIONS: [what is this?]
   Provincial (1851) by MissScarlett
   Boden - Owen (1858) by MissScarlett


Search Sacrifice Explorer for Samuel Boden
Search Google for Samuel Boden

SAMUEL BODEN
(born May-04-1826, died Jan-13-1882, 55 years old) United Kingdom

[what is this?]

Samuel Standidge Boden was born in 1826. His tournament results include 1st at the London Provincial tournament 1851, 2nd at Manchester 1857 and 2nd at Bristol 1861. He beat Rev. John Owen in a match in 1858 (+7, =2, -2) and was the chess editor for 'The Field' from 1858 to 1873. Paul Morphy considered him to be his strongest English opponent.

Boden's record against Morphy in casual games was (+1, =4, -6). His name is also linked to the Boden-Kieseritzky Gambit: 1.e4 e5 2.♗c4 ♘f6 3.♘f3 ♘xe4 4.♘c3 ♘xc3 5.dxc3 f6.

A kind of checkmate pattern called "Boden's Mate" involves two well placed bishops. It is exemplified in R Schulder vs S Boden, 1853.

note: Boden played on the teams of Boden / Loewenthal / Kennedy & Steinitz / Boden.

Wikipedia article: Samuel Boden

Last updated: 2022-09-08 21:40:47

Try our new games table.

 page 1 of 6; games 1-25 of 136  PGN Download
Game  ResultMoves YearEvent/LocaleOpening
1. J Boden vs S Boden  ½-½281847Casual gameC40 King's Knight Opening
2. Harrwitz vs S Boden 0-1191847Blindfold simul, 2bC51 Evans Gambit
3. NN vs S Boden  0-1181848Casual gameC23 Bishop's Opening
4. S Boden vs Saint-Amant  1-0231850Odds Game (Pf7+1)000 Chess variants
5. J Boden vs S Boden ½-½421851Odds game (Pf7+1)000 Chess variants
6. S Boden vs Saint-Amant  1-0341851Casual game000 Chess variants
7. J Boden vs S Boden  0-1451851Mutual odds game (Ng1 - Blindfold)000 Chess variants
8. J Boden vs S Boden  ½-½431851Odds game (Pf7+1)000 Chess variants
9. S Boden vs Harrwitz 1-0361851Simul, 3bB45 Sicilian, Taimanov
10. S Boden vs NN 0-1201851Casual gameC42 Petrov Defense
11. S Boden vs J Boden  1-0261851Odds Game (Nb1)000 Chess variants
12. NN vs S Boden  0-1241851Casual gameC41 Philidor Defense
13. S Boden vs NN  1-0181851Odds Game (Ra1)000 Chess variants
14. E Lowe vs S Boden  0-1321851Casual gameC41 Philidor Defense
15. E Lowe vs S Boden 0-1391851Casual gameC40 King's Knight Opening
16. S Boden vs NN  1-0381851Casual gameC38 King's Gambit Accepted
17. S Boden vs R Brien 1-0471851Provincial Tournament, LondonC21 Center Game
18. C Ranken vs S Boden 0-1211851Provincial Tournament, LondonC53 Giuoco Piano
19. R Brien vs S Boden 1-0111851Provincial Tournament, LondonC01 French, Exchange
20. S Boden vs R Brien  ½-½411851Provincial Tournament, LondonC50 Giuoco Piano
21. S Boden vs C Ranken 1-0261851Provincial Tournament, LondonC54 Giuoco Piano
22. R Brien vs S Boden  0-1411851Provincial Tournament, LondonC41 Philidor Defense
23. S Boden vs C Ranken 0-1311851Provincial Tournament, LondonC38 King's Gambit Accepted
24. S Boden vs S Angas 1-0351851Provincial Tournament, LondonB32 Sicilian
25. S Angas vs S Boden  0-1231851Provincial Tournament, LondonA30 English, Symmetrical
 page 1 of 6; games 1-25 of 136  PGN Download
  REFINE SEARCH:   White wins (1-0) | Black wins (0-1) | Draws (1/2-1/2) | Boden wins | Boden loses  

Kibitzer's Corner
< Earlier Kibitzing  · PAGE 2 OF 2 ·  Later Kibitzing>
Jul-19-13  Gottschalk: De acordo com o site Edo Historical Ratings http://www.edochess.ca/tournaments/... foram jogadas 4 partidas entre Boden e Brien no torneio London Provincial. Eu submeti a vitória de Boden na C21, mas cheegames.com se recusou a aceitá-la. Assim, continuam constando apenas 3 jogos entre Boden e Brien, na database daqui.
Oct-20-13  Karpova: A few snippets from the obituary in the February 1882 'British Chess Magazine':

Page 54:
<The melancholy duty devolves upon me this week of announcing the death of Mr. S. S. Boden, which took place at his chambers in Tavistock-street, Bedford-square, on Friday morning, 13th Jan. Mr. Boden was born on the 4th of April, 1826, and consequently was not quite fifty-six years old. His health had been for some time failing, but the immediate cause of his death was typhoid fever.>

<For the last four years Mr. Boden had abandoned the practice of Chess, but he always continued to cherish a deep interest in the Chess news of the day;>

<I would describe him, socially, in the language which Bassanio used of Antonio:->

Page 55

<The kindest man,
The best condition'd and unwearied spirit
In doing courtesies; and one in whom
The ancient Roman honour more appears
Than any that draws breath.>

<Mr. Boden first won his spurs in 1851, when he carried off the first prize in the provincial tournament. He was never a great match player, but he was, as Captain Evans phrased it, a master of all parts of the game; and in 1857, and for some years afterwards, he was acknowledged to be the best English player.>

<Chivalrous to the highest degree as a combatant, he never made idle excuses for a defeat, or depreciated the skill of an opponent.>

<Mr. Boden wrote a very valuable work, entitled 'Popular Introduction to Chess' and for thirteen years conducted the chess column in the 'Field', and was the author of the article on Chess which was published in 'Chamber's Encyclopedia.' He also wrote the introduction to the 'Westminster Papers'.>

<He was a water-colour painter of no mean skill, and many of his drawings would compare not unfavourably with the smaller productions of Birket Foster.>

May-07-15  TheFocus: <The pupil wants not so much to learn, as to learn how to learn> - Samuel Boden.
Jan-13-16  TheFocus: Rest in peace, Samuel Boden.
Jul-14-17  zanzibar: In Harding's thesis he notes the following to end his bio:

"Then retired to concentrate on his hobby of painting."

Jun-13-18
Premium Chessgames Member
  Stonehenge: See http://streathambrixtonchess.blogsp...
Jul-10-18  sudoplatov: For comparison with <Keypusher>'s post, I checked with the 2018 EDO estimates.

Morphy 2817 #1

Lowenthal 2619 #7
de Rivière 2570 #9
Boden 2529 #13
Bird 2488 #17
Barnes 2429 #22

To put this in perspective in 1924 the equivalent rankings would yield a 5-person simul of:

Lasker 2785
Reti 2608
Levenfish 2582
Johner 2558
Romanasky 2528
Bohatirchuk 2508

May-14-21
Premium Chessgames Member
  MissScarlett: <Did Boden ever play Barnes? Surely they must have.>

From Boden's first <Field> column:

T Barnes vs S Boden, 1858

May-15-21
Premium Chessgames Member
  MissScarlett: You wait 160 years and then two come along at once:

T Barnes vs S Boden, 1858

Both employ a variation that Boden would shortly use against Morphy:

Morphy vs S Boden, 1858

Sep-08-22
Premium Chessgames Member
  MissScarlett: <A few snippets from the obituary in the February 1882 'British Chess Magazine':

Page 54:
<The melancholy duty devolves upon me this week of announcing the death of Mr. S. S. Boden, which took place at his chambers in Tavistock-street, Bedford-square, on Friday morning, 13th Jan. Mr. Boden was born on the 4th of April, 1826, and consequently was not quite fifty-six years old.>>

Ancestry.com has two records for <Samuel Standidge Boden>.

One is a baptismal register for the Independent chapel in East Retford, Notts.

The entries are hand-written:

<Samuel Standidge, son of James and Mary Frances Boden was born 4th of May 1826, in the parish of West Retford, and baptised July 27th in the same year. Jas. Boden>

Other surrounding entries are also signed <Jas. Boden>; one even ends with <and baptised....by James Boden (from Sheffield)>.

So it appears that Boden's father was minister of the church/parish around this period. When Boden first emerges on the chess scene in the 1840s, he lived in Hull, so the family must have returned to Yorkshire.

The other record doesn't appear in manuscript form:

<Name: Samuel Standidge Boden

Gender: Male

Birth Date: 4 May 1825

Baptism Date: 5 Feb 1826

Baptism Place: Queen St Independent OR Congregational,Sheffield,York,England

Father: James Boden
Mother: Mary Frances>

<Source Information

Ancestry.com. England, Select Births and Christenings, 1538-1975 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014.

Original data: England, Births and Christenings, 1538-1975. Salt Lake City, Utah: FamilySearch, 2013.>

Sep-11-22
Premium Chessgames Member
  MissScarlett: <Quite where the middle name “Standidge” came from is not immediately evident.>

https://mannchess.org.uk/People/Bod...

I'm surprised Mann didn't dig a little deeper because he would surely have identified the figure of <Sir Samuel Standidge> as being the likely source given the Hull connection:

<A merchant and mariner credited with reviving the British whaling trade in the mid 18th century. After a career on the sea, he retired and made a successful business of securing government contracts to transport troops, food and equipment. This was especially lucrative in the years leading up to the war of independence in the American colonies. He also supplied troop ships and transport charters to the Russian government during the Russian Turkish War in 1789. He was awarded a Russian knighthood and other treasures for his service to the Russian government.

Standidge was the Sheriff of Hull, later an Alderman and eventually the Mayor. He lived at No.1 High Street and his house still stands in the Old Town of Hull. He entertained the British Prince, William of Gloucester, and was knighted by King George III in 1795. Sir Standidge is buried in the north aisle of the church and is commemorated by a white marble memorial wall plaque.

(Information gleaned from a biography published in Wildridge, T. Tindall,1884, "Old and New Hull", published by MC Peck & Son, Hull, p 37 to 40)>

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial...

But what's the familial connection?

Mann notes that Boden's mother was <Mary Frances Boden (née Thornton, 1800/01, Hull; only daughter of John Thornton of Hull)>.

An online family tree reveals Mary Standidge (1751-1821), a daughter of Samuel, married John Thornton in 1769:

https://www.myheritage.com/names/ma...

So was this Boden's grandfather?

Unlikely given that his mother was born, according to Mann, in 1800/1 which would make Mary Standidge, 49/50 years old at the time. Also the circumstance, that John Thornton must have died long before, because Mary, according to the family tree, was remarried in 1788 to James Thornton, presumably John's brother.

So I surrmise that one of Mary / John's children (said to number four) was another John Thornton (born in the early-mid 1770s) and it was he who fathered Mary Frances.

All of which means, if correct, that <Sir Samuel Standidge> was Samuel Boden's great-great grandfather. If I had a myheritage subscription, I would be able to definitely confirm this.

Sep-11-22  stone free or die: <<Karpova> <He was a water-colour painter of no mean skill, and many of his drawings would compare not unfavourably with the smaller productions of Birket Foster.>>

https://www.invaluable.com/artist/b...

stonehenge's link might be better:

http://streathambrixtonchess.blogsp...

Sep-11-22
Premium Chessgames Member
  Dionysius1: Good name for a boat.
Sep-13-22  stone free or die: Samuel Standidge Boden McBoatface?
Sep-14-22
Premium Chessgames Member
  Dionysius1: SS Boden McBoatface if you like
Sep-14-23
Premium Chessgames Member
  MissScarlett: His entry in <Victorian Painters> (4e, 2008) by Christopher Wood:

<London landscape painter. Exhib. 1865-73 at SS and elsewhere. A work by him is in the BM.>

They give his dates as 1826-1896, although he died in 1882. <SS> refers to the Society of British Artists, Suffolk Street (as was): https://www.royalsocietyofbritishar... <BM> is British Museum.

Sep-14-23
Premium Chessgames Member
  MissScarlett: Boden's work in the British Museum:

https://www.britishmuseum.org/colle...

https://www.britishmuseum.org/colle...

https://www.britishmuseum.org/colle...

https://www.britishmuseum.org/colle...

https://www.britishmuseum.org/colle...

Jan-22-25
Premium Chessgames Member
  MissScarlett: C.N. 12094:

<Boden took a number of years to come to his best as a player, his peak arriving in 1858. In 1851, he won the London “Provincial” tournament. He beat Rev. John Owen convincingly in a match in 1858, but his match play successes were otherwise limited. His reputation seems to have exceeded his actual achievements. Morphy’s description of him in 1858 as the strongest English player can be valid only if one excludes Löwenthal on the grounds that he was not naturalized until 1866, and Staunton, because he had retired, since it could be argued that both were stronger than Boden in 1858.>

Where did Morphy state that he considered Boden the strongest English player (or, at least, the strongest he faced)?

The claim is made in C. A. Buck's <Paul Morphy: His Later Life> (1902) and also in Lawson's biography - I suspect Lawson is uncritically echoing Buck, even though he himself listed numerous examples where Buck's account was factually incorrect or unsubstantiated.

Edge, of course, would be the obvious source, but I drew a blank.

Jan-22-25  stone free or die: <Missy>, being cryptic as usual, doesn't supply who actually wrote the content of the quoted material - I believe it's <John Townsend>, who sent his Boden notes to Winter for publication.

You can both Boden's peak prowess, and his precipitous decline in performance, reflected in his EDO rating:

http://www.edochess.ca/players/p25....

.

Jan-22-25  stone free or die: Compare to EDO's rating chart for Loewenthal:

http://www.edochess.ca/players/p11....

(It would be nice if EDO had the ability to overlay the rating charts for two players for comparison purposes)

Jan-23-25
Premium Chessgames Member
  keypusher: <SFOD> Boden’s Edo rating appears to be based on a very small number of games, over half of them in a single year. During his “decline” he doesn’t seem to be playing at all, at least as far as Edo is concerned.

The first half of Loewenthal’s decline appears to have occurred over the board, though he, too, seems to have hardly played after 1867, at least according to Edo.

Thanks to the efforts of people here (including you!) it seems like more 19th century games are being added. Maybe Edo could be improved upon?

Jan-23-25
Premium Chessgames Member
  keypusher: <Where did Morphy state that he considered Boden the strongest English player (or, at least, the strongest he faced)?>

When I first played over Morphy's games, then not in terms of results, but in terms of how closely contested individual games were, Boden seemed to be as competitive with Morphy as anyone. At his peak I think he was a pretty strong player.

Jan-23-25  stone free or die: <kp> As always, thanks for keeping me honest!

Yes, you're right, I did overlook the fact that Boden essentially retired soon after his peak rating - and EDO used very few games to gauge his decline.

Rod Edwards is very receptive to contributions, and I know he's benefited from input from many people, like Tim Harding, etc.

As Edwards says:

<I have been systematically mining 19th century sources that are available to me, but have reached only to 1875 so far for most of them, to 1876 for some of the British sources, and 1878 for the Illustrated London News column. For early German and Dutch sources I have systematically covered up to 1871 so far.

I plan to continue deep coverage of the 19th century mainly from primary sources, but may continue to extend shallower coverage of early 20th century events>

http://www.edochess.ca/Edo.explanat...

Back to Boden. We all agree that inactivity = decline in play. The question is how much?

Glicko's rating system, for example, strongly emphasizes this. I suppose it would be interesting to gauge Boden's post-1860 (say) play vs. his projected decline as a measure, despite the low stastics.

Anyway, I don't intend this to be an entire thesis - but I think I will go back and check EDO for some other players with long periods of inactivity - e.g. Morphy and Lasker, to compare.

* * * * *

As far as Boden's peak goes, again relying on EDOchess, he didn't make the top-10 list for the decade 1855-1865:

http://www.edochess.ca/top.graphs/g...

.

Jan-23-25
Premium Chessgames Member
  perfidious: <zed....I don't intend this to be an entire thesis....>

The 'thesis' here lies in Edwards' exposition of Edo, which can be off-putting to someone like myself who is merely curious as to how much weight inactivity is given in this model, as opposed to that of Sonas', which selectively punishes it, in some instances severely so.

Jan-24-25  stone free or die: Yes, <perf>, Edwards addresses this very point, and the text is dense. I won't trouble the forum with an extensive quote, but it's under the heading:

<A note on comparison to the new Chessmetrics ratings>

http://www.edochess.ca/Edo.explanat...

I will quote his brief comment on comparing the two systems for Lasker:

<Note, for example, the periodic dramatic drops in Chessmetrics ratings for Lasker, in periods where he was not active. On resuming active play, his Chessmetrics rating always rapidly pulls up again to a level similar to where it was before the gap, suggesting that in reality, his strength had been at that level all through the gap.

<[Now that the Edo ratings extend into the 20th century, however, it is interesting to note that Lasker's Edo rating drops significantly between 1899 and 1903, only to rise again by 1914 to a level similar to his 1899 level. Thus, at least one of the drops in Lasker's rating seen in Chessmetrics also appears here. This actually reflects weaker results in this period, especially at Cambridge Springs 1904. (Feb. 2014)]>>

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