Blackburne bowled Grace....0

Joseph Henry Blackburne gave an enormous number of simultaneous displays. One such was held in Bristol in March 1888, where he played (and lost to) W G Grace junior, son of the famous cricketer. Grace junior was to go on to study mathematics and get a cricket Blue at Cambridge, and later play cricket for Gloucestershire, but he was never in the same class as his illustrious father. He became an assistant master at Oundle and then a Science Instructor at the Royal Naval College at Osborne, where he died of peritonitis at the age of 31. At the time of this game he was just 13 years old. Presumably it was played as part of the same blindfold simul where Blackburne played (and beat) John Burt, the author of the Bristol Chess Club.

Blackburne,J - Grace,WG jun.
Bristol, 3 March 1888.
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.0-0 d6 5.b4 Bxb4 6.c3 Ba5 7.d4 exd4 8.cxd4 Bb6 9.Bg5 Nge7 10.Nc3 0-0 11.Nd5 Kh8 12.Nxe7 Nxe7 13.Re1 f6 14.Be3 d5 15.exd5 Nxd5 16.Nh4 Ne7 17.Qf3 c6 18.Rad1 Nd5 19.g4 Qd7 20.h3 Re8 21.Kh1 Ba5 22.Rg1 Bc7 23.Rg2 b6 24.Kg1 Qd6 25.g5 Nxe3 26.fxe3 fxg5 27.Rf1 gxh4 28.Qf7

28...Bg4! Everything else loses. 29.Rf4 Rf8 30.Qxg7+ Kxg7 31.Rgxg4+ Kh8 32.Rf7 Qh2+ 0-1

Sources: Clifton Chronicle and Directory, March 1888. Grahame Parker, Gloucestershire Road: a history of Gloucestershire County Cricket Club, Pelham Books, 1983.

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