[1] The Club meets each Wednesday evening during University term time.
[2] On the day of the foundation of OUCC, the minutes book recorded:[3] Prince Leopold, later Duke of Albany (1853–1884) (and son of Queen Victoria) was President of OUCC in 1875.
The annual Varsity Match against Cambridge University was originally suggested by Howard Staunton in 1853.
[1] Edwin Anthony, then President of the Club, and Wilhelm Steinitz were responsible for establishing the match.
[6] With a twenty-year perspective on the matches, Henry Bird wrote that the greatest of the matches were the first two, held in 1873 and 1874 at the City of London Chess Club, City Restaurant (Perrott's), 34 Milk-street, Cheapside.
[7] The first match was said to have had 600 to 800 spectators and the second no fewer than 700, thought to be record attendance at any chess tournament up to that time.
Each team consisted of seven players, and sand glasses were used to time some of the games at the limit of 20 moves per hour.
The 1874 match was attended by nearly every London chess luminary of the time, including Howard Staunton, Wilhelm Steinitz (officiated as an umpire), Johann Löwenthal, Bernhard Horwitz, Johannes Zukertort, Henry Bird, Joseph Henry Blackburne, Cecil Valentine De Vere, George Alcock MacDonnell, Samuel Boden, Patrick Thomas Duffy, Adolf Zytogorski, John Wisker, and others.
In 1978 a memorable upset occurred when IM Michael Basman beat Oxford postgraduate GM John Nunn with the Grob.