One square, one king

Batsford Solitaire

Ten columns from two decks with forty-five cards face down and a single pass through the stock. The one concession is a reserve square that holds exactly one king — the game's answer to a board where only kings can open a space.

Ten columns
A reserve for one king
45 cards face down
One stock pass

Found0/104

Stock49

Waste0

ReserveEmpty

Hidden45

Moves0

Stock and waste

Waste empty

Draw one card to the waste. The stock has one pass only.

King reserve

One available king can wait here.

Eight foundations

Build foundations by suit and use the king reserve carefully.

Ten columns, one king

Batsford Solitaire rules

The reserve square is the rule worth printing — it accepts kings and nothing else.

Batsford Solitaire setup and rules
Setup
Decks	Two standard decks — 104 cards.
Tableau	Ten columns of one to ten cards; only the last of each is face up.
Face down	Forty-five of the fifty-five tableau cards.
King reserve	One empty square beside the stock.
Stock	The remaining forty-nine cards.
The king reserve
What it holds	One king, and nothing else. No other rank may go there.
Where it comes from	The waste.
Where it goes	To an empty column, or to a foundation once that suit is ready.
Capacity	One card at a time. It must be emptied before it can be reused.
Moving cards
On a column	Down by alternating colour.
Sequences	Any correctly alternating run moves as one unit.
An empty column	Kings only.
To a foundation	Ace first, then up in suit, across eight foundations.
The stock
Drawing	One card at a time to the waste.
Passes	One. There is no redeal.
Consequence	A king you decline in the waste is a king you may never see again.

The king held back

How to play Batsford Solitaire

Fifty-five cards go out as a ten-column staircase with only the last card of each column face up — forty-five hidden in all, the most of any game in this family. The remaining forty-nine cards are the stock, and you get one pass through them.

Columns build down by alternating colour with unlimited sequence moves, eight foundations build up in suit from the aces, and only a king may start an empty column. Beside the stock sits a single reserve square that will hold one king, taken from the waste, until you have somewhere to put it.

The reserve exists because kings are scarce and the stock runs once. Ten columns compete for eight kings, and a king arriving in the waste before you have a space would otherwise be wasted. The square lets you bank exactly one of them — which is why leaving it occupied for half the game quietly costs you every king that follows.

The reserve square

What the reserve square accepts

Legal and illegal Batsford moves
The move	Verdict	Why
A king is on the waste and the reserve is empty. You put it there.	Legal	This is what the reserve exists for.
A queen is on the waste and the reserve is empty. You put it there.	Illegal	Kings only. The square refuses every other rank.
A king is on the waste, the reserve already holds one. You add it.	Illegal	The reserve holds a single card.
A column empties. You move the reserve king into it.	Legal	Exactly the intended use — a king held back for the moment a space appears.
A column empties. You move a queen into it.	Illegal	Only kings start columns, in the tableau as in the reserve.
You move an 8♥ 7♠ 6♦ run on to a black nine.	Legal	Runs of any length move together.
The stock runs out. You gather the waste for a second pass.	Illegal	One pass only.

Managing the kings

Batsford Solitaire strategy

Keep the reserve square turning over. Take a king when one appears, and place it the moment a column opens. An occupied square is a square that cannot save the next king.

Open a column before you need one. Because the reserve can hold a king in advance, the two halves of the problem can be solved in either order — and having the king ready is the easier half to arrange.

Do not clear more columns than you have kings for. Eight kings against ten columns is a hard ceiling, and an empty column with no king in reach is worse than a column with two cards in it.

Spend the single pass deliberately. Forty-nine cards, once. Every draw should either place a card or be a considered decision to let one go.

When kings run out

How a Batsford table runs out of kings

Leaving the reserve empty while kings go past

Forty-nine stock cards go by once. A king that reaches the waste and is not taken is gone, and with ten columns wanting kings you cannot afford to be fussy. If the reserve is empty and a king appears, the default is to take it.

Filling the reserve early and forgetting it

The square holds one card, and while a king sits there it cannot accept another. A reserve king parked in the first twenty draws and still sitting there at the end has blocked every later king from being saved. Place it in a column as soon as a space appears, even a space you had other plans for.

Digging the ten-card column too late

Ten columns means the deepest holds nine hidden cards, and with a single stock pass there is no second chance to come back to it. Work on the right-hand end of the table early, while you still have stock cards to feed the moves that uncover it.

One-pass odds

Is Batsford Solitaire winnable?

It is the hardest of the two-deck Klondikes here. Forty-five hidden cards is the most in the family, ten columns is the widest board, and a single stock pass gives the least room for error of any version on this site.

The reserve square is a real help but a narrow one — it saves a single king. We do not publish a win rate: the number for this family is dominated by the pass limit, and one pass is as tight as it gets.

This version

Ten columns, one pass, one king held back

Two decks: ten columns of one to ten cards, last of each face up.
Eight foundations built up in suit from the ace.
Down by alternating colour, with runs of any length moving together.
Empty columns take kings only.
One reserve square, holding a single king taken from the waste.
Draw one card at a time, one pass, no redeal.

Undo is unlimited and unpenalised, with no timer or score. Some published Batsford rules add a second reserve or allow a redeal; both make the game considerably easier than this one.

The nine-column deals

Batsford against the nine-column deals

All four build the same way and all four want kings for their spaces. Batsford trades stock passes for board size and gets one reserve square in compensation.

Batsford compared with Gargantua, Harp, and Klondike
Game	Columns	Face down	Stock passes	Extra help
Batsford	10	45 of 55	1	A reserve square for one king
Gargantua	9	36 of 45	2	None
Harp	9	36 of 45	4	None
Klondike	7	21 of 28	Unlimited	None

If Batsford is too severe, Harp keeps the same building rules on a smaller board with four passes instead of one.

Explore

More solitaire games

The nine-column versions at two and four passes, and the single-deck original.

Tested rules

How this solitaire game is checked

Game logic is implemented and tested by Brian Hamilton, then reviewed by Karan Hamilton for rule clarity, player flow, and correction notes.

How we make and test solitaire games