The Blackburne Shilling Gambit

A trap deep-dive: what happens after 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nd4, and why the greedy reply loses.

Since most players have probably never seen this opening, it may be well worth keeping this variation in your ‘treasure chest’.

A cartoon treasure chest, lid open, filled to the brim with gold coins.

If you are Black you will probably catch your opponent off guard, so after attacking with cannon fire, arm yourself with swords and pistols and go fighting hand-to-hand.

A black naval cannon on a wooden carriage, lashed down with rope.

The position after 3…Nd4. The pawn on e5 is bait.

How the trap runs

Play it through. The moment that decides the game is 4.Nxe5 — the free pawn that is not free.

The Blackburne Shilling Gambit 0–1

1. e4  e5
              These two opening moves are the most popular
          2. Nf3  Nc6  3. Bc4
              Standard stuff, but Black makes a surprising move !
          3… Nd4  4. Nxe5
              white grabs a free pawn
          4… Qg5
              Queen attacks both Knight and g2 pawn
          5. Nxf7
              forking both Queen and Rook
          5… Qxg2
              attacking white's Rook
          6. Rf1  Qxe4+  7. Be2
              White's Queen protects the Bishop, but....
          7… Nf3#
              with the Bishop pinned, it's a smothered checkmate!
          0–1

Black offers the e5 pawn. Taking it, and then taking the fork, loses to a smothered mate on f3.

More of these on the chess traps page, and a second, more heavily annotated version of this same line sits on the annotated games page.