The Ennis Shield is the third division of the Leinster Leagues, run by the Leinster Chess Union. Commenced in 1926, it was originally the second division of the Leinster leagues with its top teams promoted to the Armstrong Cup. In 1971 another league, the Heidenfeld Trophy, was formed and took over as the 2nd tier of Leinster Chess, making the Ennis Shield the 3rd division. The league and trophy are named after Major Ennis who presented the trophy to the league.

Ennis Shield, pic: JL.

Teams in the league consist of six players, and there are twelve teams in the league. The winning two teams get promoted to the Heidenfeld Trophy and the bottom two teams get relegated to the O'Hanlon Cup. Players have to be registered with the Irish Chess Union. All games are rated by the ICU, and in 2018/19 for the first time games were rated by FIDE.

The first Ennis Shield season, in 1926-1927, was competed for by UCD and Irish Army GHQ (McKee Barracks), the lowest two teams in the previous season's Armstrong Cup. They were joined by teams from Rathmines, the Jewish Union (Harrington Street, Dublin), Dublin Corporation (Ormond Quay) and Non-Commissioned Army Officers.

Gaps in the winners listed below from the original wikipedia article were filled in thanks to [7], though some blanks or blank plaques remain.

Abbreviations: P = Promoted.

Author unknown. Copied from Wikipedia in 2024 and edited by John Loughran. Mark Gonnelly sent a picture of the shield which filled in some missing winners [7]. Colmcille chess club was sometimes engraved as Cumann Fithchille Chuilm Cille.

Please send corrections and updates to John Loughran on skerrieschess.com/contact.