Serafino Dubois

Part Two

Last months column discussed Serafino Dubois (1817-1899), the last great Italian
chess master of the 19th Century, concentrating mainly on his lengthy series of
games with Marmaduke Wyvill in 1846. The fact that Dubois demonstrated a
definite superiority in that series, combined with the fact that later Wyvill would
finish second in the first international tournament, London 1851, indicated that
Dubois ranked very high among mid-19th-century players. This was further
reinforced by his results against the leading players of Paris in the mid-1850s. We
continue now with Dubois Parisian period.

I cannot understand why Dubois name was not raised as a possible opponent for Morphy
New Stories about when the American visited England in mid-1858 and Paris in late 1858 to early 1859, or
when Morphy again visited Paris in 1863. Dubois had beaten the other French players
Old Chess Players quite recently, so you would think his visit would have been fresh in peoples minds. And
one of Morphys opponents on both Paris visits was Rivire, who knew Dubois well. The
Chess Players Chronicles comment that his skill [is] so well attested by all who have
Jeremy P. Spinrad acquaintance with it, not to mention his later invitation to London 1862, clearly shows
that Dubois was also known in England. For some reason, however, although I have seen
various publications of that time mentioning Staunton, von der Lasa, Petroff, Lange,
Hamppe, Campbell, and others as potential Morphy opponents, Dubois name never came
up, to my knowledge. In my opinion, Dubois would have been as strong an opponent for
Morphy as could be found at this time.

Serafino Dubois

The following game comes from Tartakower and DuMonts 500 Games of Master Chess,
page 410, and with one lapse, is played nicely by Dubois.
Rivire-Dubois, Paris, 1858 (notes by Taylor Kingston, assisted by Fritz8): 1.e4 d5 2.
exd5 Nf6 3.Bb5+ Bd7 4.Bxd7+ Qxd7 5.c4 c6 6.dxc6 Nxc6 7.Nf3 e5 8.0-0 e4 9.Re1 0-0-0
10.Ng5

Dubois has played the Scandinavian Defense in

energetic gambit style, and has more than ample
positional and developmental compensation for
his pawn. His position is in fact so strong that he
can afford a further sacrifice. 10...Qf5! 11.Nxf7
Bc5 12.Rf1 Of course, if 12.Nxh8 Bxf2+ 13.Kh1
Bxe1 and Black is clearly better. 12...Ng4 13.
Nxh8

13...Nxf2 A good move, though even stronger

was 13...Rd3!, when if 14.Nf7 Qh5! forces 15.
Qxg4+, since if 15.h3 Rxh3! wins. 14.Qe1 Or 14.
Rxf2 Qxf2+ 15.Kh1 Rf8 16.h3 Rf3! and wins.
14...Rf8 15.d4

15Bxd4? A mistake; correct was 15...exd3 16.

Be3 Nh3+ 17.gxh3 Bxe3+ 18.Kg2 Qe4+ and
mate shortly. 16.Nd2?? White errs right back.
Instead, he could have escaped with 16.Be3! Nh3
+ 17.gxh3 Bxe3+ 18.Kg2, when unlike the 15...
exd3 line, 18...Qe4+ is not possible, and Black
must play either 18...Bf4 or 18...Qg5+ 19.Kh1
Rxh8, in either case conceding that his attack has
stalled with material loss. Now Dubois finishes
him off. 16...Nd3+ 17.Kh1 Nxe1 18.Rxf5 Rxf5
 For the moment, material is equal, but tactically
and positionally White is lost. Dubois quickly
weaves a mating net. 19.h3 e3 20.Ne4 Rf1+ 21.
Kh2 Be5+ 22.g3 Nd4 23.h4 h5 24.Ng5 Nef3+ 25.
Nxf3 Rf2+ 26.Kh3 Nxf3 0-1

The next game shows a major difference between

offhand games of the romantic period and
modern serious games. There are a great many
moves that I could not predict in this game. They
are not easily characterized as good or bad; they
are often odd ways to counterattack or avoid
standard sound defensive moves. The game is
taken from Schlechters edition of the Handbuch,
page 774. There is only one comment on the game there: Blacks eighth move is given a
question mark, though in fact it is not all that bad objectively. Dubois is never really
behind in the game, but he makes mistakes in the sense of passing up solid advantages
in order to keep up pressure that can be countered with best play. No doubt the quality of
his opposition, which included one of Morphys hapless victims in the famous opera box
game (about whom see here), and the lack of serious motivation, at least partly explain
Dubois style here. The one move that I would call a blunder is Blacks twenty-first.
Although 21Kd7 looks dangerous, it is necessary, and leaves Whites path to victory not
at all clear. One wonders if the score is entirely accurate. In the final position, the
Handbuch claims a mate in three for White, but as it stands he has a mate in one.

Dubois Duke of Brunswick + Count Casabianca + Jean Preti, offhand (date?): 1.e4 e5
2.f4 exf4 3.Bc4 Qh4+ 4.Kf1 g5 5.Nc3 Bg7 6.d4 c6 7.Nf3 Qh5 8.e5 b5 9.Bb3 h6 10.Ne4

Targeting the weak d6-square. 10...Bf8 11.d5

Possibly the sort of instance referred to, where
romantic leanings prompt Dubois to bypass an
objectively better move. Much stronger is 11.
Qe1, intending attack along the e-file after Ne4-d6
+, Bf8xd6, and exd6+. 11...c5 12.Qe1 But now
he has the right idea! 12a5 13.Bd2 A very
good move, though somewhat better was 13.Nd6
+ Bxd6 14.exd6+ Kf8 15.Qc3 Rh7 16.Qxc5 Ba6
17.c3, intending Bb3-c2, with an almost winning
position. 13...b4 14.d6 Ba6+ 15.Kg1 Nc6

16.Nf6+

Definitely an instance of romanticism. Better

simple moves included the straightforward 16.
Nxc5, 16.h3 (to deter ...g5-g4), and 16.Bd5. 16...
 Nxf6 17.exf6+ Kd8 18.Ne5
18c4?
After
18...
Bxd6 19.
Nxf7+
Kc7,
Whites

advantage is minimized. 19.Nxc6+ dxc6 20.Qe5

Threatening 21.Qxa5+, and if Black tries to
prevent this by 20...Bb5, then 21.Re1+ Kd7 22.
Qf5+ Kd8 23.Qc5 cxb3 24.Qb6+ wins. The main
alternative was 20.Qe4, when given the quality of
the opposition 20cxb3? 21.Qxc6 and wins was
likely, but had the duke and company found 20...
Bb7! 21.Qd4 Kc8 (21...cxb3 22.Qb6+) 22.Bxc4
Bxd6 23.Qxd6 Rd8! a draw was conceivable. 20...
cxb3 21.Qxa5+

21...
Ke8??
After
21...
Kd7! 22.
Qf5+
Kd8 23.
Bxb4,
White
would
still
have an

advantage, but no immediate win. Now its

elementary, Watson. 22.Re1+ Be7 23.Qc7 Rd8
And here the Handbuch says mate in three, but
quicker is 24.Qxe7# immediately.

Although I know of later games and matches

involving Dubois and players from other parts of
Europe, I do not know whether these were held in
Italy or elsewhere. The next time I am sure that
Dubois goes north is for the famous tournament,
London 1862, an event that in effect decided
whether Adolf Anderssen or Louis Paulsen would
be considered the worlds best after Morphys
self-imposed retirement.

As noted in my May 2007 column, Dubois had a major effect on the final standings: by
beating Paulsen, he made Anderssen the tournament winner (Anderssen beat Paulsen,
which was Paulsens only other loss, and Anderssen lost only to Owen). Dubois
apparently was sick for part of the tournament. The tournament book deals with this in
discussing Dubois game against Anderssen. The game lasted less than an hour in total,
and Lwenthal says of Dubois that in fact his play was extremely bad, and could only be
accounted for as arising from indisposition. In contrast, the London Times (July 5, 1862)
gives quite a different impression of the same game: The most brilliant game was that
between Anderssen and Dubois, which lasted little more than an hour, was finished at the
25th move, and elicited all the skill of the two greatest players of Germany and Italy. I do
not know how to reconcile this with the fact that the tournament book gives a thirty-two
move game between these players, which can also be found in many current sources
including the Oxford Encyclopedia of Chess Games.

I have seen similar claims of indisposition in other books, excusing what I believe was
simply poor play, but Dubois seems to actually have had health problems during the
tournament. The London Times article summarizing tournament results (Aug 8, 1862) says
that Signor Dubois is an example of a first-class player whose energies are not
sufficiently strong to undergo the fatigues of a heavy match.

Dubois lost over the board only to Steinitz and Anderssen, but by forfeiting games to
MacDonnell and Owen he fell to =4th-5th with MacDonnell, behind Anderssen, Paulsen
and Owen, and on tie-break he slipped to 5th prize. Had he won those forfeited games, he
would have tied Paulsen for 2nd. He was then challenged by Steinitz, who beat him +5 -3
=1 in the first of Steinitz incredible streak of match wins. Dubois also murdered
Valentine Green in matches, both at even strength and when ceding pawn and move.

Two games from around this time show Dubois versatility, and show him probably at his
best against the best: versus Paulsen and Anderssen, almost inarguably the two strongest
players in the world at that time, aside from Morphy. The first, from the London 1862
tournament, demonstrates Dubois sound technique in a queen endgame.

Paulsen-Dubois, London 1862:

27...f3! A far-sighted move leading to a

simplified position favorable to Black. 28.Bd3 If
28.gxf3 Qg5+ 29.Rg4 Qxg4+ 30.fxg4 Rxf2 31.
Kxf2 Bxc4 and wins. 28...Bxd3 29.Rxd3 fxg2 30.
Rf3 Ke7 31.Rxf6 gxf6
32.c4 Dubois has seen if 32.Qxg2? Qe1+ 33.Qf1
Qxf1+ 34.Kxf1 Kd6 35.c4 Ke5 36.Ke2 Kd4 with
an elementary win. 32...h5 33.Kxg2? It still
wasnt safe to take this pawn. 33...Qe4+ 34.Qf3
Qxc4 35.Qe3+ Kd8 36.Qd2 Kd7 37.h3 Kd6

No saving the d-pawn, so White at least avoids

the exchange of queens. He succeeds only
temporarily. 38.Qb2 Qxd5+ 39.Kf2 Qf5+ 40.
Kg2 h4 41.a4 Qe4+ 42.Kf2 Qf4+ 43.Kg2 Qg3+
44.Kh1 Qxh3+ 45.Kg1 Qg3+ 46.Kh1 Qf3+ 47.
Kg1 h3 48.Qd2+ Ke7 49.b5

49...Qg2+ 50.Qxg2 hxg2 51.Kxg2 Ke6 52.Kf3

Kf5 0-1

The second example, from Anderssen-Dubois,

match, London, 1862, is of an entirely different
stripe.

This strange-looking position, which is only

going to get stranger, occurred in London around
the time of the 1862 tournament. This match
required both antagonists to play the Kings
Gambit, and features some great games between
two masters of the attack. In this case it is Dubois
who assumes Anderssens accustomed mantle.
34...Rxd4! 35.Kb1 Nc3+ 36.Kc1 e2 37.a6 exd1Q
+ 38.Rxd1 b6 39.Qb7+ Kd8 40.Rd2 f3 41.a7
Ke7 42.Nb4 Qf4 43.Nc6+ Kf6
 A bizarre position; the pieces seem almost
distributed at random, nonsensically. But Dubois
finds his way. 44.Nxd4 fxg2! 45.Nf3 Bh6 46.Bb2

Now we get the kind of Todestoss Anderssen

more often delivered than received: 46Qxd2+!
47.Nxd2 g1Q+ 48.Kc2 Qd1+ 49.Kxc3 Bxd2# 0
1

After the London tournament, the German chess

writer Dufresne arranged a job for Dubois in
Holland, but Dubois hated it there, and returned
to Italy, where he remained a dominant figure in
Italian chess.

So far, Dubois seems only to be a great talent who squandered a couple of chances to rise
higher, by failing to get to London 1851, and by forfeiting games at London 1862. His real
influence on Italian chess, and unfortunately a negative one, came from a different aspect
of his chess career.

Dubois was the last great European advocate of alternate chess rules. Variant rules then
extant included whether to allow en passant captures, what to do when promoting a pawn
(in some rules of this time, promotion was allowed only to a piece which had already been
captured, though you could leave your pawn on the eighth rank, to promote later if some
better piece was taken), and Dubois particular passion: free castling. Castling had a
number of variants, including allowing castling with the king in check, but Dubois
particularly believed in allowing interchange of the rook and king in more flexible ways.
For example, the king could be placed on h1 and the rook on g1, or the king on h1 and the
rook on f1. Dubois, and others, argued that otherwise the castled positions were
monotonously uniform.

It is surprising, when reading old chess books, to realize how much attention there was on
such basics of the game: rules, notation, and time limits all are discussed passionately and
at length. Indeed, while we think of London 1851 as Stauntons plan for a tournament in
the modern sense, both Staunton and von der Lasa thought that the primary purpose of the
event was to gather the masters to settle these various rules issues, and that the lack of this
agreement was a more serious problem than the flaws in the tournament design (a
knockout format with random pairings), which we can relate to much more easily.

In most of Europe, standardization prevailed quickly regarding rules, though less so for
notation. While the rules were being solidified, Dubois attempted to form an axis of
strangeness between Italy and Russia, hoping to keep chess in those countries free of the
standardization trend. I dont know whether this led other countries to denigrate Italian
chess, but at the least it justified to some the notion that Italy could be viewed as a kind of
backwater, rather than a major chess power. Whatever the reason, Italian chess did
decline. A few years before Dubois death in 1899, Italy suffered perhaps its greatest chess
embarrassment, then or ever, as the Italian player Beniamino Vergani performed miserably
at Hastings 1895, scoring +2 -17 =2 to finish dead last of twenty-two; in a sense even
worse than last, as he was 4 points behind the twenty-first place finisher.

Thus, Dubois was in some sense the opposite of Ludwig Bledow (profiled in an earlier
article here). While Bledow nursed a weak chess culture in Germany and produced a
champion, Dubois despite tremendous talent and energy led Italian chess from being
arguably the best in the world (my opinion only here) to decidedly second-rate status. Yet
Dubois was probably one of the best players in the world at times in the 1840s and 1850s.
Around 1848 I would group Dubois with von der Lasa and Staunton (perhaps Kieseritzky
and Petroff as well), and in the mid 1850s, with Anderssen inactive and Morphy not yet
active, he would again have been one of the real contenders.

Another great player, unjustly forgotten. In honor of his heroic but doomed efforts to
promote free castling, I close this article with a game played using the Italian castling
rules. It is not clear to what extent the quality of play can be attributed to those rules, but if
every game would be made this exciting, I would certainly be in favor of free castling!
The computer can find quite a number of improvements for both sides, as is typical in such
a wild game, but still I think the reader will enjoy it. I include two notes from The Chess
Monthly, to whom the game was provided by Louis Centurini of Genoa.

Marquis Ciccolini - Dubois, Rome, 1850 (comments in italics from the 1860 Chess
Monthly, pp. 52-54; others by Taylor Kingston, assisted by Fritz8): 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.
Bc4 Bc5 4.Kh1/Re1 A method of castling permitted by the Italian code. 4d6 5.d3 Nf6 6.
Bg5 h6 7.Bh4 Ng4!?

A terrible blunder if either the white king or rook

were in a normal castled position. It would seem
taking full advantage of free castling rules was
not always a good idea. 8.Rf1 g5 9.Bg3 h5 10.h4
f6 11.c3 Qe7 12.b4 Bb6 13.b5 Na5 14.Bd5 Bd7
15.a4 Ka8/Rc8

Italian rules again. 16.Na3 c6 17.bxc6 Bxc6 18.

Nb5? This should cost at least a pawn. Bxd5 19.
exd5 a6
20.c4? The sacrifice of the Knight, although
happily conceived, avails nothing on account of
Blacks well developed attack on the other wing.
The contest illustrates a peculiarity of Italian
play resulting from one of the methods of castling
in vogue in Italy. The Kings occupying the Rooks
square, the points of attack are the Rooks Pawns
in front of them. If White wanted to sacrifice the
knight, 20.Rb1 was the more logical way. Of
course, 20.Na3 simply drops a pawn to 20
Rxc3. 20axb5 21.axb5 Kb8 22.Qa4 f5

23.hxg5?? Much better was 23.Nxg5 f4 24.Bh2,

when White stands worse but is not lost. Now
Black gets more material and a strong attack.
23h4 Naturally. 24.Bxh4 Rxh4+ 25.Nxh4
Qxg5 26.g3 If 26.Nf3 Rh8+ etc. 26Rh8 27.
Qb4 e4 28.dxe4 fxe4 Not at all bad, but 28...Rxh4
+! 29.gxh4 Qf4 was immediately decisive. 29.
Kg2

29...Nxc4?? A serious mistake that could have

cost the game. Correct and decisive was 29
Qe5, threatening 30Rxh4 31.gxh4 Qh2#, to
which White has no good answer. 30.Qxc4 Rxh4

31.Rh1?? White in turn misses his chance,

though admittedly it was far from obvious: 31.
Ra8+!! Kxa8 32.Qc8+ Ka7 33.Ra1+ Ba5 34.b6+!
Kxb6 35.Rb1+ Bb4 36.Rxb4+ Ka5 37.Rb2!,
when to stop Qa8 mate, Black must give up his
rook and find a series of checks: 37Rh2+ 38.
Kg1 Rh1+ 39.Kxh1 Qh5+ 40.Kg2 Qh2+ 41.Kf1
Ne3+ 42.Ke2 Qh5+, and finally after 43.g4 Qxg4
+ 44.Qxg4 Nxg4 45.Rxb7, Black is forced to
accept a lost R-vs.-N endgame. However, after
the text, Dubois attack crashes through. 31
Qd2 32.Qa2 Ne3+ 33.Kg1 Rxh1+ 34.Kxh1 Nc2
35.Qa8+ Kc7 36.Rf1 Qxd5 37.Qe8 e3+ and
wins.
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