Isidor Gunsberg

Isidor Arthur Gunsberg ( November 2, 1854 in Pest, † May 2, 1930 in London ) was a British chess player Jewish- Hungarian origin.

As Gunsbergs Jewish parents emigrated in 1863, he came at the age of nine years to England. Three years later he accompanied his father on a business trip to Paris. Here he made the Café de la Regence stir. At 25, he decided to abandon the learned profession of a merchant, and to act as a professional chess player.

Initially, he worked with Charles Godfrey Gumpel, who had developed a chess automaton Mephisto. Gunsberg was of small stature and was able to hide in the chess machine therefore. The playing strength of the machine became known soon.

In the 1880s he was the tournaments in Hamburg in 1885, London in 1885, Bradford in 1888 and London in 1888 to decide for themselves. In the tournament of New York in 1889, in which 20 participants played double round, he finished third and also won a beauty contest for his match against James Mason.

Also in duels he was successful: in 1886 he won against Henry E. Bird ( 5:1 at 3 draws ), 1887 against Joseph Henry Blackburne ( 5:2 at 6 draws ). In 1890, he managed to hold a contest in Havanna against Russian Mikhail Chigorin top players draw ( 9:9 at 5 draws ).

His success meant that he was given the opportunity to challenge the reigning world chess champion Wilhelm Steinitz. The competition took place on 9 December 1890 to 22 January 1891 in New York instead and ended after a hard fight with a 8,5:10,5 defeat ( 4 wins, 6 losses and 9 draws).

Gunsberg even then took part in several major tournaments, where his best finish was the shared second place in London in 1900. The last reported in the tournament was in Chester in 1914, where Gunsberg finished in third place.

He worked as a chess journalist and wrote for several newspapers, so it was not just rely on prize money from tournaments. He also organized themselves tournaments, for example in Ostend in 1906, and promoted young talents.

Gunsberg was seen as fickle and unsteady, both in his game and in his life. Alexander Alekhine wrote in 1930 in an obituary about Gunsberg that this is not particularly original, but was flexible but players who had got on very well on the exploitation of the weaknesses of his opponents.