Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 54.djvu/123

 at the exchequer by a substitute (, Orig. p. 38;, Hist. Exchequer, ii. 53). On 27 March 1324 Staunton resigned the chief-justiceship, and on 26 March was reappointed chancellor of the exchequer. He resigned the latter post on 16 July 1326, when he was appointed chief justice of the common pleas (Parl. Writs, ii. pp. ii, 1458). Staunton seems to have sided with Edward II, and in September Queen Isabells seized eight hundred marks which he had deposited at Bury St. Edmunds (Chr. Edw. I and Edw. II, i. 314). He was not reappointed on the accession of Edward III, and the proceedings of an iter he had held at London were reversed (ib. i. 328; Cal. Pat. Rolls,Edward III, i. 2). As prebend of Husthwaite, York, and parson of East Derham, he is mentioned as receiving protection on 30 Jan. and 11 Feb. 1327 (ib. i. 1, 10). On 2 March he had license to alienate in mortmain the manor and advowson of Barenton to the masters and scholars of St. Michael, Cambridge (ib. i. 25). Staunton died in 1327, before he could give effect to his foundation, and the license was renewed to his executors (ib. i. 232, 319, 366, ii. 146). He was buried in the church of St. Michael, Cambridge. His foundation of Michael House was eventually absorbed in Trinity College, where Staunton is still commemorated as a benefactor.



STAUNTON, HOWARD (1810–1874), chess-player and editor of Shakespeare, born in 1810, was reputed to be the natural son of, fifth earl of Carlisle [q. v.] He was neglected in youth, and received little or no education. He is said to have spent some time at Oxford, but was never a member of the university. On coming of age he received a few thousand pounds under his father's will. This money he rapidly spent. He was devoted to the stage, and claimed to have acted in his early days Lorenzo to the Shylock of Edmund Kean. When thrown upon his own resources, he sought a livelihood from his pen. The main subjects of his literary labours were chess and the Shakespearean drama.

Staunton played chess from an early age, and soon acquired a skill in the game which has not been equalled by any British-born player. (1798–1835) [q. v.], who could alone be regarded as his rival, is now regarded as his inferior by competent critics. For some twenty years a great part of Staunton's time was spent in playing the game and in writing upon it. From 1836 he frequented the Divan, Huttmann's, and other public chess resorts. Four years later he first became known as a player of distinction, and between 1840 and 1851 he made his reputation. During 1841 and 1842 he engaged in a long series of matches with Cochrane, and in the majority was victorious. A match at Paris with the champion of Europe, St. Amant, followed in 1843, and Staunton's victory gave him a world-wide fame as a chess-player. Carl Meier, among others, published an account of this engagement (Zurich, 1843). In 1846 Staunton defeated the German players Horwitz and Harrwitz. An account of his match with Mr. Lowe in 1848 was published by T. Beeby. In 1851 his powers showed signs of decay, and in the great international tournament of that year he was beaten by Anderssen and by Williams; to the latter he had given odds not long before. In 1852 he met one of the greatest players of any period, Baron von Heydebrand und der Lasa of Berlin, and was defeated by a small number of games. He rarely played in public matches again. George Walker, a rigorous critic, credited Staunton's play with ‘brilliancy of imagination, thirst for invention, judgment for position, eminent view of the board, and untiring patience.’

Meanwhile Staunton was energetically turning his knowledge of the game to account as a journalist. In 1840, the year in which his supremacy as a player was first recognised, he projected the monthly periodical, ‘The Chess Player's Chronicle,’ which he owned and edited till he sold it in August 1854. About 1844 he took charge of the chess column in the ‘Illustrated London News,’ which had been commenced two years earlier, and he conducted it till his death. For some time he also edited a chess column in the ‘Era’ newspaper.

Staunton compiled for Bohn's ‘Scientific Series’ some valuable manuals on the game. Of these ‘The Chess Player's Handbook’ (1847; 2nd edit. 1848) long deserved, and still longer retained, the reputation of being the best English treatise on its subject. ‘The Chess Player's Companion’ (1849) included a treatise on games at odds, and so far was supplementary to the ‘Handbook,’ but it was mainly devoted to the record of his own games. ‘This still remains a work of the highest interest, and a noble monument for any chess-player to have raised for himself. The notes are in general as much distinguished by their good taste as by their