Vincenz Hruby...Who Was He?

    You probably never heard of the Czech master Vincenz Hruby (September 9, 1856 – July 16, 1917). That’s too bad because he seems to have been a pretty good player! 

    Chessmetrics shows him as being active between January 1882 and April 1893, His highest ever rating was in May of 1883; it was 2615 which placed him tied with Louis Paulsen for 9th-10th in the world. He won matches in Vienna against Berthold Englisch in 1882 and Adolf Albin in 1891.

    He was born in Krivsoudov, Bohemia, today a city in the heart of the Czech Republic. He worked as a teacher at a secondary school in Trieste, Italy which is where he died. And that’s about all that’s known of him. Chessgames.com has a scant database with only 52 of his games. 

    Here is one of his gaes from the great second international tournament at Vienna 1882. It was a super-strong event; according to Chess metrics nine of the ten top players in the world participated. Hruby’s opponent was Austrian master Adolf Csank (1841-1900).