Yorkshire Chess History

Contents:

J Carr Smith

Home

Narrative

Born:
Baptised:
Died:
Buried:

Identity of the Chess-Player

“J. Carr Smith” or merely “Carr Smith” appears in match records of the 1880s as the name of a leading member of Sheffield’s Arundel Chess Club, but the identity of “J Carr Smith” is far from clear.

There is the question of whether the surname is “Smith” or “Carr Smith”. In a report of the annual meeting of the Arundel Chess Club, on 22/09/1883, as reported in the Sheffield & Rotherham Independent of 29/09/1883, there are two instances of “Carr-Smith” (with hyphen) and one of “Carr Smith” (without hyphen). In a list of scores in the club tournament, our man is “Mr. Carr Smith” (no hyphen), while the other players’ name taken the form of “Mt. J. Reoch” (i. e. “Mr.” followed by inial and surname). This report seems to imply “Carr Smith” was regarded as a double-barrelled surname.

Either way, the usual birth, marriage, death, census and directory sources fail to throw up anyone conclusively answering to “J Carr Smith” anywhere near Sheffield during the relevant period.

A person who closely resembles the chess-player is a “Joseph C. Smith” who was born in Woolwich, Kent, worked as a railway clerk, and lived in Sheffield during the period of J Carr Smith’s chess activity. Hardly anywhere is there evidence of what the “C.” stood for, but it turns out his marriage in Sheffield was registered as that of Joseph Charles Smith.

Maybe a John Smith, or similar, chose to adopt his mother’s maiden name as a middle name, without it being official for the purposes of birth and death records.

“J. Carr Smith” remains an enigma.

Non-Chess Life and Death of Joseph C. Smith

Elusive.

Chess life of J. Carr Smith

“Carr Smith” of Arundel Chess Club played on board one for “The Rest” in the 1883 match Sheffield Athenaeum Chess Club v. The Rest of the Sheffield & District Chess Association, losing one game and drawing the other.

“Carr Smith” of Sheffield played for Yorkshire in the 1883 Yorkshire-Lancashire match, losing both his games.

“J Carr Smith” of Sheffield played for Yorkshire in the 1884 Lancashire-Yorkshire match, losing both his games.

Created

15/07/2013

Census information is copyright of The National Archive, see UK Census Information

Last Updated

20/08/2013