Myth number one
The wall of the English club is adorned with a painting of a game of snooker, which was created at a time considerably earlier than Chamberlain’s documentation of the rules.
The painting in question is by Henry O’Neil, located at the Garrick Club, London. It dates back to 1869, which was long before snooker was officially created. At first glance the painting depicts a game of snooker; however, a closer look reveals that this is not the case.
We have zoomed in on a section of the picture that clearly shows the location and colour of the balls on the table. A yellow ball cannot be a cue ball in snooker, especially since there are two yellows on the table. Furthermore, two white balls cannot be on the table at the same time, etc. Unfortunately, the picture is not clear enough to tell whether the yellow or other balls have a spot or a cross on them. But there should be some kind of difference.
We asked Peter Ainsworth to confirm or deny this myth. With the author’s permission, we present his reply in full:
The painting being referenced is the one by Henry O’Neil RA which hangs in the Garrick Club, London.
It was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1869 and the group are not engaged in a game of snooker, but a game of life pool. This is how the club themselves describe it on their website: https://garrick.ssl.co.uk/object-g0793
‘Members of the Garrick Club in 1869 play a game of pool at the billiard table. Sir Charles Taylor, seated at his coffee table seems to be in control of events as he watches Edward Tredcroft take an awkward long shot. Twelve other members are taking part in the game; the other gentlemen look on. The billiard table is shown in the first floor Morning Room of the new club house, finished only five years before the picture was painted. It is possible that the table was placed in this room, but it seems more likely that O’Neil set the scene in the large downstairs room in order to squeeze in all the portraits.‘
Some confusion about the type of game being played was created by Mordecai Richler in his book ‘On Snooker‘ (2001) (pages 32-33) in which he states: ‘There is evidence that Chamberlain merely transported a game already in place in London into India. A Notice of the rules of ‘Savile and Garrick Snooker,’ dated 1869, still hangs in the Garrick, and included is a saucy rule that reads “In the event of the yellow ball being involved in a foul stroke, it is the custom of watchers to cry out ‘Bollocks.’ In the same room hangs an 1869 painting by Henry O’Neil, R.A., that shows a large number of club members, including Anthony Trollope, watching an early form of snooker, possibly life pool.’
In 2019 I wrote to Moira Goff (Librarian, Garrick Club) to see if I could get some clarification regarding Richler’s confusion, and received this reply:‘The Billiard Room was relocated to the Basement of the Garrick Club about five years ago, and the notice to which Mordecai Richler refers has been re-hung outside its door. This is titled ‘Rules, Penalties and Customs appertaining to the game of Savile Snooker as played by Members of the Savile and Garrick Clubs on the occasions of their Annual Games Contest’. It is undated and we have no additional information about it. However, it is very unlikely to date to 1869 – although the page is framed and thus cannot be fully examined, the paper, the printing and the typography suggest a much later date. More helpful to your enquiry may be that the Club’s ‘Rules and Regulations’ of 1869 refer only to ‘billiards’ and the ‘Billiard Room’. The Club’s ‘By-Laws’ of 1877 refer to both ‘billiards’ and ‘pool’ in the Billiard Room. The term ‘snooker’ is never used, even in later editions of the Rules and By-Laws. Successive historians of the Garrick Club refer to ‘billiards’ and ‘pool’ – Richard Hough in The Ace of Clubs; A History of the Garrick (London, 1986), on p. 135, refers to billiards adding ‘never snooker!’. So far as I can tell, the term ‘snooker’ is not used in the various records of the Garrick Club’s history.‘
But Mordecai Richler’s assertion that “… early form of snooker, possibly the life pool …” is met with a degree of bemusement. It is immediately apparent that the author has not read any literature on the history of billiards. This statement is analogous to the common misapprehension among non-specialists that English billiards is played on a snooker table. However, Mordecai Richler is correct in one: it is indeed a Life Pool game.