Club History

St Albans Chess Club ^[1] held its first meeting on Thursday 28th March 1878 in the Council Chamber of the Town Hall. It was attended by 26 players. Shortly afterwards, the club began meeting at Queens Hotel (now TSB Bank) in Chequer Street on Thursday evenings, between 6.00 and 11.00pm.

In its first full season (1878-79), the club organised a programme of friendly matches against local clubs. The first of these was against Luton, played at home on 14th November 1878 and away on 19th December 1878. Although Luton won the first leg (St Albans 6 v 9 Luton), St Albans took the second (Luton 9 v St Albans 11) resulting in the match being drawn.

Matches soon followed against Hertingfordbury, Harpenden, Ware and Watford.

Below is a list of the club's principal officers (work in progress).

Notes

1. Although the whereabouts of the minute book and other records prior to the 1930's are unknown, many of the chess clubs early activities were reported in local newspapers. The Herts Advertiser, for instance, which is published weekly has articles covering the chess club's inaugural meeting, matches against other clubs, a match conducted by telephone (when home telephones were rare), and simultaneous exhibition matches by leading players (Isidor Gunsberg, José Raúl Capablanca).

2. An archive of local newspapers is held on microfilm at Hertfordshire Archive and Local Studies section of the Hertfordshire Library Service.