The Most Beautiful Queen Sacrifice in Chess History

Welcome everyone! Today we're diving into one of the most famous and beautiful chess games in history. A game that earned the nickname the American beauty where spectators threw gold coins after the last move which was truly spectacular. It featured the great Frank Marshall against the strong Russian master Stefan Levitsky. Before we get into the game a quick word about the players. Levitsky was no amateur. He won the Russian championship in 1911 and was a respected master of his time. But today he's mostly remembered for being on the receiving end of this masterpiece. And Marshall on the other hand was the US champion from 1909 all the way till 1936. An incredible 27 year reign. He was known for his attacking style, creativity and for giving us the famous Marshall attack in the Ruy Lopez opening. Now the game. It begins with d4 e6, e4 d5 transposing into the French defense. After knight to c3 we get the move c5. Today c5 is marked as an inaccuracy because there is a popular line that goes like this. e takes on d5, e takes on d5 and after pawn takes on c5 and bishop c5. Black's problem is that this pawn is isolated meaning that there are no other pawns on the nearby files and this will be a weakness in the long run and in an eventual endgame. So nowadays this line is considered a little worse for black but back in time it was okay. Then we have the move knight to f3, knight c6, e takes on d5, takes back, bishop to e2, knight f6, castles, bishop e7, bishop g5 and then castles by black. So here we finish the opening setup for both players. Here white decides to take the pawn on c5 leaving this pawn on d5 isolated which is going to be a liability in the endgame and he is weak because there are no other pawns on the nearby files. However black cannot take this pawn back instantly because he will lose the pawn on d5. So if he were to take on c5 then bishop to f6, queen to f6 and suddenly this pawn on d5 has no more defenses and after queen takes d5 white is simply up a pawn. So this is the reason why black doesn't rush and he firstly plays bishop to e6 reinforcing this pawn on d5 and after knight to d4 now black is ready to take back and regain his pawn from c5. Now here white makes a bad decision deciding to trade this active knight for the weak bishop on e6 because he is simply stuck between two pawns and white is indeed helping black develop because after this trade the pawn structure is becoming better given that this pawn is no longer isolated because he has a neighbor on the e-file and also the f-file is open for the rook to potentially hit this pawn on f2 together with the bishop and maybe in the future the queen will join the attack or the other rook will create a battery along the f-file. So this trade really helps black. After the trade white decides to play bishop to g4 targeting this pawn and black will play a very good move because he is doing two things at the same time. He's going to defend this pawn and also get rid of this pin playing queen to d6 and now because this pin is no longer available knight takes g4 is quite a threat so this is the reason the bishop retreats back to h3 and Marshall calmly brings his last piece into play rook a to d8. Already black's pieces are coordinated and pointing towards the white king white plays queen to d2 connecting rooks but Marshall strikes with bishop to b4 pinning the This pin is very unpleasant for white because black has a lot of tricks. The first move is knight to e4 threatening to take the queen the bishop and also piling up pressure on this pinned knight from c3 and the other threat is simply pawn to d4 which is going to win this knight. So white has to be really careful and find the only move bishop takes f6 getting rid of the first threat. After rook takes f6 white plays a provocative move rook a to d1 and now even though it looks like i can play pawn to d4 and win this knight this is a blunder because white has an intermediate move knight to e4 and yes black can take this queen but after that white will take the queen on d6 and suddenly black has two pieces attacked at the same time so he's most likely to lose one of them and eventually lose the game so black doesn't have to rush and don't play pawn to d4 instead the best move here is queen to c5 maintaining pressure and eventually threatening d4 now white tries to reorganize with queen to e2 but Marshall captures on c3 winning a pawn after b takes on c3 and queen c3 white regains material with rook takes d5 a clever tactic exploiting the pin on the e-file just to illustrate the point this rook cannot be taken because queen to e8 will follow and after rook to f8 which is forced bishop to e6 the king has to step back on h8 and then queen f8 is simply checkmate so this is the reason why black has to be really careful and not take this poisonous rook from d5 but black plays a clever move knight d4 and now white has some trouble because the queen and the rook are both attacked at the same time then comes queen to h5 from Levitsky eyeing the rook for the second time we are not able to take this rook from d5 because we will lose our rook from e8 but black plays a calm move rook to f8 piling pressure on this f2 pawn and here white plays an only move rook to e5 it's a great move and i called it an only move because the rook doesn't have any other good squares let's say that the rook went to d7 well then white can lose the game fairly easy after rook f2 rook takes back from f2 queen to e1 rook f1 and queen f1 checkmate so in order to take this square e1 and not allow checkmate white had to find the move rook e5 as played in the game so now the queen can no longer join the attack this is why it's an only move after that we have rook to h6 attacking the queen and the queen went to g5 after queen to g5 marshall plays rook takes h3 a brilliant sacrifice of the exchange with the idea to rip open lines around the king white cannot capture the rook because of a devastating knight fork with check so if the rook were to be taken knight f3 is close to ggs because the king the queen and the rook are all attacked and the game is lost for white white simply loses on the spot if he takes the rook so white comes up with a clever idea rook to c5 trying to build more pressure on this queen and potentially take this rook in the near future but now it's your time to find the immortal move which is soon going to be declared the most beautiful queen sacrifice of all time here marshall plays the move queen to g3 a queen sacrifice offered for free in the middle of the board so i remind you that this is not a forced move it's not a check and the queen can be taken in three different ways however all of them lead to a losing position and this is the move that gained the game its legendary status according to the famous story spectators were so stunned that they showered the board with gold coins now it's time to examine why capturing the queen doesn't work in any way let's start with the easiest one if the queen were to be taken with the h pawn knight to e2 is simply checkmate we have a similar idea for f takes on g3 we go knight to e2 his only option is king h1 and after that rook to f1 is checkmate but what happens if he takes our queen with his own queen well then we give a check and it's a fork to the king and the queen he has to go to h1 and we take his queen and deliver another fork this time to the king and the rook and this knight cannot be taken either because this is an illegal move because it's a check and if it's taken like that we give checkmate so the king again has to step to g1 then we take his rook he takes our rook and we go away with the knight on d2 and we are simply up a piece so this is enough material to win the game this sacrifice was so spectacular that Levitsky resigned after Marshall played this extraordinary move queen to g3 if you liked the video please leave a like comment your favorite move although i might know what your favorite move is and subscribe to the channel to not miss any interesting content