Alexander McDonnell

Alexander McDonnell (1798–1835), sometimes spelled MacDonnell, was an Irish chess master, who contested a series of six matches with the world's leading chess player Louis-Charles Mahé de La Bourdonnais in 1834. Early life The son of a surgeon, Alexander McDonnell was born in Belfast in 1798. He was trained as a merchant and worked for some time in the West Indies. In 1820, he settled in London, where he became the secretary of the Committee of West Indian Merchants in which role he advocated strongly on behalf of slave-owning sugar plantation owners. It was a lucrative post that made him a wealthy man and left him with plenty of time to indulge his passion for chess. In his politics, McDonnell was a committed Whig. Chess career In 1825, he became a pupil of William Lewis, who was then the leading player in Britain. But soon, McDonnell had become so good that Lewis, fearing for his reputation, simply refused to play him anymore.