SHEFFIELD Chess History |
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Davy Trophy |
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Although the Sheffield and District Chess Association was formed in 1883, it was not until 1909 that a trophy was presented for tenure by the winners of the inter-club team competition which today has become the top division of what is loosely called the “league”, though back in 1909 there was no second division or other similar competition.
The trophy takes the form of a silver rook, with two diametrically opposed handles. It is about 20cm high, and the base is about 12.5 cm in diameter. The rim of the cup takes the form of battlements, as typically surmount a rook; the slightly odd thing is that there are seven battlements, which is at odds with the bilaterally symmetry arrangements of the handles. On its front it is inscribed as follows:
Sheffield Chess Association The “Davy” Challenge Trophy 1909 On the base is the inscription:
Presented by Mr. Ernest R. Davy, in memory of his father
The trophy bears the sterling silver mark, the Sheffield assay marks for 1909, and two maker’s marks. One of makers mark consists of a shape containing letters arranged as follows: W SS H LD &
This mark looks as if it might be that of William Hutton & Sons Ltd, after whom Hutton’s Chess Club was named. The other maker’s mark consists of five downward-pointing parallel arrows running from top left to bottom right, and another five downward-pointing arrows running from top right to bottom left, the two sets being roughly orthogonal.
(Click here for a photograph of the trophy.)
Ernest Richards Davy’s father was chess-playing Arthur Davy of Arthur Davy & Sons, who died in 1902. Arthur Davy was president of the Sheffield Athenaeum Chess Club at the time of the establishment of the Sheffield & District Chess Association in 1883, and became the Association’s first president.
The Sheffield & District & Chess Association had ceased to exist in 1908, and Sheffield Chess Club had assumed responsibility for running the Association’s affairs, and Ernest R Davy became one of the club’s vice-presidents. Perhaps he thought his father’s Sheffield & District Chess Association had died for good, and so introduced a continuing memorial to his father. The choice of the wording with “Sheffield Chess Association”, which has never been the formal title of any organisation (unless it be in the United Stated), may have been a way of sidestepping the political issue of whether it was the Association or the “club regent” which had the right to rule. In the event the S&DCA was resuscitated in time.
The new trophy was first awarded to the winners of the competition of the season 1909-10, West End Chess Club, who went on to win it five times out of the trophy’s first seven seasons, showing West End to be the dominant club at the time.
Successive winners of the trophy, as engraved thereon except items in italics, have been as follows:
* engraved twice for 2012!
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Created 14/05/2012 |
Copyright © 2012 Stephen John Mann |
Last Updated 16/02/2021 |