Barden has a Morphy number of 3 by six different routes. He drew with Jacques Mieses in the Premier Reserves at Hastings 1948–49. Mieses drew with Henry Bird in the last round of Hastings 1895, and Bird played a number of games with Paul Morphy in 1858 and 1859. Mieses also beat Louis Paulsen at Breslau 1889. Morphy and Paulsen played at least 11 games against each other in 1857. Barden also played four opponents of James Mortimer: Edward Sergeant, Savielly Tartakower, Sir George Thomas, and Eugene Znosko-Borovsky. Mortimer is known to have played Morphy many games in Paris during the 1850s and 1860s.