Category Archives: Fairy

Minor Pieces 76: Charles Dealtry Locock (3)

You’ve already read about Charles Dealtry Locock’s career as a chess player and problemist. In the final part of this trilogy you’ll learn more about his life, and about what might be seen as his most lasting and significant contribution to chess.

You’ll recall that he married his first cousin, Ida Gertrude Locock, and that they had two daughters. Both were named after characters in Wagner operas who met unfortunate ends: was Wagner his favourite composer?

Elsa, born in 1891, received her name from a character in Lohengrin, who, to cut a long story short, died of grief after her brother was turned into a swan. She worked for a time as a shorthand typist, did voluntary social work for the Red Cross during the Second World War, and died unmarried in 1985.

Her sister, born in 1894, was named Brynhild, a version of Brünnhilde from the Ring Cycle, a Valkyrie who, to cut a very long story short, rode her horse into a funeral pyre after the death of her lover Siegfried. (If you’d like to find out more, Anna Russell is considerably shorter and much more amusing than Wagner.) In fact her name was registered twice, the second time as Hilda Vivien, which she seemed to prefer. She worked as a children’s nurse, and died, again unmarried, in 1950.

Although Locock gave up competitive over the board chess in 1899, he played on Board 2 for the South of England in a correspondence match against the North the following year. He was matched against the mathematician George Adolphus Schott, winning a brilliant game. As always, click on any move for a pop-up window.

In the 1901 census the family were living in Camberley, on the Surrey-Hampshire border, along with four servants: governess, parlourmaid, cook and housemaid.

Charles’s occupation was described as ‘living on own means & literature”. His particular literary interests were the poems of Percy Bysshe Shelley and Swedish poetry and drama. It appears that he was also still writing a regular chess column in the science magazine Knowledge at this point (some of them are available online).

The same year he had his first book published: neither literary nor chess related, but about the game of billiards. Entitled Side and Screw, you can read it here.

Chess and billiards weren’t Locock’s only games. He was also very much involved in the game of croquet, editing the Croquet Association Gazette between 1904 and 1915, and being employed as the Croquet Association handicapper from 1907 to 1929.

More books followed: Modern Croquet Tactics in 1907, Olympian Echoes, a book of poems and essays, in 1908 (here), and, in 1911, an edition of Shelley’s poetry (Volume 2 here).

In October 1910 he made a rare appearance at the chessboard, taking part in one of a series of consultation games between the veterans Blackburne and Gunsberg. His team was unsuccessful, but the game was exciting.

By the 1911 census the family were in the Hertfordshire market town of Berkhamsted, now employing only two servants, a Swiss cook and a parlourmaid. Charles’s occupation was given as Editor and Handicapper.

In 1912 he celebrated his 50th birthday by writing his first chess book, which, unfortunately, doesn’t appear to be available online.

Hampshire Post and Southsea Observer 13 September 1912

By 1915, Charles Dealtry Locock, returned to playing chess, having joined the Imperial Chess Club, here giving a simultaneous display.

West Sussex County Times 01 May 1915

Here’s his loss against solicitor George Bodman, formerly of Bexhill, whom he may well have known from his time in Sussex chess.

It’s possible his marriage had broken up by this time, and he was living in London. Either way, the social atmosphere of the Imperial (about which there’s much to be researched and written) would have been ideal for Locock, who loved chess while not enjoying the pressures of competition.

Linlithgowshire Gazette 16 July 1915

Locock continued at the Imperial for the rest of the decade, and, in 1920, returned to correspondence chess, playing on top board for Kent against an Italian magazine, and scoring the full point when his opponent went wrong in a bishop ending.

In the 1921 census, Charles Dealtry Locock, claiming to be still married, was visiting a widow named Rose Edith Heath in 4 Ferry Road, Barnes. (I got off the bus about 100 metres from there the other day: perhaps I should have walked in the other direction to say hello.) I don’t know whether he was just visiting a friend, or whether there was anything else to their relationship. Ida and Elsa, working for the Red Cross as a shorthand typist, were living in Redcliffe Square, just south of Earl’s Court. Brynhild was in Scarborough, a trained nurse but working as a servant for a young doctor, perhaps helping to care for his infant son. I’d like to think she bought her groceries from Edward Wallis, whose shop was only a short walk away.

By this time, Locock was very much engaged in translating Swedish poetry and plays, particularly those of Strindberg, into English (for which he was awarded a silver medal in 1928), and resigned from his post at the Imperial Chess Club in 1923. He was still actively involved in the world of chess composition, though, publishing another collection of problems and puzzles in 1926.

You might think that, approaching his seventies, it was time to wind down his chess career, but in fact he had a few more moves to make.

In 1930 he published a booklet entitled 100 Chess Maxims (for Beginners and Moderate Players). Perhaps I’ll review this further another time. For the moment I’ll just say that, while it contains much excellent advice, some of the maxims are decidedly odd.

No. 4, for instance (translated into algebraic by Carsten Hansen) advises you not to play your c1-bishop to f4. Devotees of the London System won’t be happy.

Then there’s:

37. The object of the game is to mate, and as quickly as possible. Captures are only made to deprive the king of his defenses.

Perhaps I’m wrong, but I always thought the object of the game was to mate as certainly as possible. If you look back to some of his games in the first article of my Locock trilogy, you’ll see some examples of him playing in exactly this way 40 years or so earlier.

This book might, in part, have been occasioned by Locock’s new career – as a chess teacher in schools, specifically girls’ schools, and specifically the Oratory Central Girls School in Chelsea. He even wrote an article about Chess for Girls for the first issue of the Social Chess Quarterly.

Hastings and St Leonards Observer 18 April 1931

This seems to have been a rival tournament to the British Girls Championship, with which Locock was also involved, which had taken place a few months previously, with the same winner. See BritBase (here) for further information on this event.

Here’s Honor having just won the earlier tournament.

The Sphere 10 January 1931

The school prizegiving that year even included a chess play.

Chelsea News and General Advertiser 20 November 1931

By 1935 one of his very young private pupils was doing rather well.

Falkirk Herald 22 May 1935

She was Elaine, not Eileen, and her family were living on the prestigious St Margaret’s Estate, on the borders of Twickenham and Isleworth.

Elaine Zelie Pritchard, née Saunders (07-01-1926, 07-01-2012)

That July she was successful again in a rather unusual event organised by her chess teacher.

Linlithgowshire Gazette 02 August 1935

Almost half a century later, Elaine wrote (British Chess  Pergamon Press 1983):

My father, assisted by a 2d. (= almost 1p) book of rules from Smiths, taught me the moves at somewhere round the age of five. We were rescued by the problemist CD Locock who noticed me playing in a girls’ tournament two years later. It was he who brought me up on a diet of the Scotch, the Evans and any gambit that was going. We analysed them in some depth – for those days – and my severe task-master made me copy out long columns of dubious lines. He also made me his guinea-pig for his Imagination in Chess and it is small wonder that I still find it hard to resist a sacrifice, and much of my undoing comes from premature sorties such as f4 and Qh5.

In retrospect he must have been a brilliant teacher. Starting in 1936 a succession of girls’ titles came my way including the FIDE under-21, and in 1939 the British Ladies at the age of 13. It is hard to assess how strong or weak one was at the time because there has been such a marked improvement in the standard of play among women over recent years. At all events, those pre-war years were happy ones, especially away from chess which took second place to horses and more physical pastimes.

(See here for more on Elaine.)

Yes, we have another book, Imagination in Chess, published in 1937.

From the author’s introduction:

Based on my own chess teaching experience I have partial sympathy with Locock’s views. I noticed at Richmond Junior Club that children learnt the Two Rooks Checkmate early on, and, if they were winning, would head for that mate, spurning quicker mates in the process. On the other hand, most checkmates don’t require sacrifices, apart from a few stock patterns which need to be remembered, just accurate calculation. While we all like to play brilliant combinations, my view is that, at club level, more games are lost by unsound sacrifices than won by sound sacrifices. Over-emphasising sacrifices to young and inexperienced players can be dangerous.

We have 60 positions, in each of which (with one exception) you can play a problem-like sacrifice to force mate. A halfway house, if you will, between problems and game positions.

A couple of examples:

This is a mate in 3: you’ll want to sacrifice your knight, and then your queen.

Here, you have to mate in 4 moves, being careful to play your sacrifices in the right order: knight, then queen, then the other knight.

If you’d like to see more you’ll be delighted to know that this book has very recently been updated, edited and published by Carsten Hansen, with 100 Chess Maxims added as a bonus. You can buy it here.

Locock also played training games with Elaine, one of which survives.

By the time of the 1939 Register, and with war imminent, the Saunders family had taken the precaution of moving out of London, and were staying in the George & Dragon Hotel in Princes Risborough – and Charles Dealtry Locock (Author, retired) was staying with them. It’s not clear how long they stayed there, and whether or not Locock was only visiting.

When he was writing about synthetic games in 1944, one of his correspondents and collaborators was a young RAF pilot named David Brine Pritchard. I’d like to think they met and perhaps played each other, if only because it would give me a Locock number of 2 (I played David, but not Elaine). I’d also like to think he introduced David to Elaine, as they married in 1952. Their daughter, Wanda, was also a strong chess player.

Charles Dealtry Locock died in Putney on 13 May 1946. Here’s his probate record.

I haven’t been able to identify Nina Agnes Wood for certain: the only likely candidate is a journalist named Agnes Nina Wood (1871-1950). I wouldn’t want to speculate.

His wife lived on until the age of 94, dying in 1962 at the same address and leaving £63975 11s: were they reconciled at the end of their lives?

There, in three parts, you have the long and eventful chess career of Charles Dealtry Locock. In the first part we looked at his competitive chess career in the 1880s and 1890s, winning the British Amateur Championship and representing his country. The second part considered his career of more than sixty years as a creative and innovative problemist. But perhaps it’s for his final act, as a pioneer in promoting chess in schools, and, particularly chess for girls, that he should be most remembered. Elaine (Saunders) Pritchard’s memoir confirms that he was a brilliant teacher.  More than that, he also pioneered the idea of solving composed positions to teach creativity and imagination. Many chess teachers today encourage their students to solve studies and problems for this reason, but Locock got there first. He should always be an inspiration to all of us involved in junior chess.

Come back soon for the story of another chess prodigy.

Sources and Acknowledgements:

Many thanks to Carsten Hansen for sending me a copy of his new edition of Locock’s Imagination in Chess + 100 Chess Maxims.

Many thanks also to Brian Denman for sending me his file of Locock’s games.

Other sources:

ancestry.co.uk
findmypast.co.uk/British Newspaper Library
Wikipedia
Internet Archive
ChessBase 17/Stockfish 16.1

 

 

 

 

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Remembering Anthony Dickins (01-xi-1914 25-xi-1987)

We remember Anthony Dickins who passed away this day (Wednesday, November 25th) in 1987.

Anthony Stewart Mackay Dickins was born at 1 Rivers Street, Bath, Somerset on Sunday, November 1st, 1914. On this day was the Battle of Coronel — The Royal Navy suffered its first defeat of World War I, after a British squadron commanded by Rear-Admiral Sir Christopher Cradock met and was defeated by superior German forces led by Vice-Admiral Maximilian von Spee in the eastern Pacific.

1, Rivers Street, Bath, Somerset, BA1 2QA
1, Rivers Street, Bath, Somerset, BA1 2QA

Anthony’s parents were Frederick and Florence Dickins (née Mackay) Frederick was a Captain in the Royal Artillery and was born on 25th November 1879, commissioned on May 26th 1900. He became a Colonel on 26th May 1930 and retired November 25th 1936. He was alive in 1972 (aged 92) and living in Bexhill passing away aged 101/102. He was awarded the CIE which is “Companion, Order of the Indian Empire in 1914”.

Anthony was baptised on December 29th in Seend, Wiltshire. Anthony had a brother Frederick James Douglas born in 1907 who married Nellie or Peggie Moist (records are unclear).

It would appear that Florence and Anthony (aged 5) travelled to Bombay from Plymouth on board the SS City of York (Ellerman Lines) departing December 26th, 1919 presumably to visit his father in India. The ships master was J. McKellan.

At the time of the 1939 Census Anthony was residing in the Tavistock Hotel in Tavistock Square. His occupation was given as journalist and editor and described as single.

From the Hull Daily Mail (extant and renamed Hull Live) of March 4th, 1939 we have this part review of a magazine called The Joys of Poetry. Anthony was the editor :

Hull Daily Mail, 4th March 1939
Hull Daily Mail, 4th March 1939

He died in Lambeth Wednesday, November 25th) in 1987. We have yet to determine where he was buried or cremated.

From http://chesscomposers.blogspot.com/2012/10/november-1st.html :

“Anthony Dickins wrote A Guide to Fairy Chess (1967) and other books about fairy chess. He edited the column of non-original fairy problems for “The Problemist”. He was specialized in constructional problems and was also an International Judge.”

Anthony Stewart Mackay Dickins
Anthony Stewart Mackay Dickins

From British Chess (Pergamon Press, 1984), Botterill, Levy, Rice and Richardson :

(article by ASMD and edited by JM Rice)

“Chess first entered my life seriously about 1950 at the well-known Mandrake Social and Chess Club in Meard Street, Soho, run by Harold Lommer and Boris Watson. Purely literary connections took me there in the first place, as it was a rendezvous for the literary fraternity, such as Dylan Thomas, David Gascoyne and others.

After the war Harold converted a small wine-vault into a tiny cramped chess-room, with some dozen tables and boards. Many well-known
personalities in the world of Chess were occasional visitors, such as Grandmasters Ossip Bernstein, Paul Keres, Jacques Mieses and Friedrich Sämisch; British Champions Willy Winter, Bob Wade and Dr. Fazekas; M. J. Franklin, now a British Master, and the Problemists, Dr. E. T. O. Slater and B. J. da C. Andrade. Mieses was then in his late eighties and charged a fee of half-a-crown (12.5 pence) for a game. When his name was mispronounced ‘Mister My-ziz’ he would say ‘I am Meister Mieses, not Mister My-ziz’.

Sämisch once played fourteen of us blindfold, defeating all except one, a very strong Indian player, Atta, who obtained a draw. My regular ‘partners’ were Vicki Weiss, the famous cartoonist, his brother Oscar, Richard Crewdson, Mr Keller (a professional who played sharply for a shifty shilling), Brian Mason, Colin ‘Puffer’ Evans, (whose strategy was to puff cigarette ash and smoke all over the board to bemuse the opponent) and Bob Troy (who always fell fast asleep immediately after making each move and had to be wakened on his next turn to play). There was a juke-box in the next room constantly blaring forth pop and bop. Most of all I played with Alex Distler, and with him always’variants of the game’ like Cylindrical Chess, Rifle Chess, Progressive Chess, or the Losing Game.

In this colourful and inspiring, if rather smoky and noisy, atmosphere I composed my first six chess problems, helpmates and cylindricals, though I did not then know of the existence of Problem books or magazines, nor had I heard of Sam Loyd, Max Lange, or T. R. Dawson when the Mandrake closed in the late fifties and Harold Lommer retired to Spain to write his two monumental works on Endgame Studies.

For the next 10 years or so I played at the West London and Athenaeum Chess Clubs, for Middlesex County and at Hastings congresses, meanwhile regularly solving the problems in the two evening newspapers for practice.

In 1965, in my 51st year, I discovered chess-problem magazines and the British Chess Problem Society, and was soon asked by John Rice to join the Fairy
Chess Correspondence Circle, whose director, W. Cross, perhaps the greatest solver of all time, guided my early footsteps in fairyland. At this point I compiled for my own use a summary of all the usual rules and conventions in Fairy Chess, as these were numerous and complicated. It occurred to me that a few other people might also welcome such a summary, so I put it into book form as A Guide to Fairy Chess, which I published by myself in 1967 under the imprint ‘The O Press’, a pun on the name ‘Kew’ where I was then living.

A Guide to Fairy Chess
A Guide to Fairy Chess

To my amazement it had rave reviews (‘the comprehensive work, so long awaited’, ‘more like an encyclopaedia’, ‘the bible of Fairy Chess’) and sold like hot cakes, going into three editions, each one enlarged and revised, the third produced by Dover Publications, New York, in 1971. Two years later I edited Dover’s publication of T. R. Dawson’s Five Classics of Fairy Chess.

Five Classics of Fairy Chess, TR Dawson
Five Classics of Fairy Chess, TR Dawson

In 1970 I flew to the States to spend a few days in the J. G. White collection in Cleveland, Ohio, researching historical material on Fairy Chess. This Ohio collection has the largest chess library in the world, and to my surprise I found that it contains also ‘every book or article ever written on or about ‘Omar Khayyam and Alice in Wonderland . To find oneself suddenly and unexpectedly transported, as if by magic carpet, into a superbly organised library with the most complete collections in the world of the three subjects that happen to be one’s own three principal literary interests is an experience that must approach closely to entering Nirvana, and I am happy to have had it. This visit enabled me to write A Short History of Fairy Chess (1975) and to give the lecture Alice in Fairyland to the Lewis Carroll Society in London, published in their journal Jabberwocky and reprinted by myself in 1976 (2nd edn 1978) .

A Short History of Fairy Chess, ASM Dickins
A Short History of Fairy Chess, ASM Dickins

In 1972 I decided to present my (by then) extensive collection of Fairy Chess books and magazines to my old university library at Cambridge to prevent the possible break-up of the collection as a single unit, and to ensure that at least one fairly complete Fairy Chess collection was retained in Britain.

In 1968 I was invited to open a Fairy Chess section in The Problemist, organ of the BCPS, which I handed over to Dr. C. C. L. Sells in 1970, and from 1974 to 1981 I ran another column in that magazine called ‘Other Types’. This chess journalism has brought me into touch with many problemists, and made many friends for me, in foreign countries.

In 1967, on a visit to Mannheim for the Schwalbe annual meeting, I met Wilhelm Karsch, then editor of Feenschach, and in 1968 in Munich I again met Dr. Karl Fabel, whom I first came to know in London in 1967, and also Peter Kniest, one of the two present editors of Feenschach. In 1969, on a visit to Paris, a meeting was arranged for me at the late Jean Oudot’s flat, with Pierre Monr6al, J. P. Boyer, F. de Lionnais (author of the Dictionnaire des Echecs) and other French problemists, and altogether I have attended twenty three major problemist meetings in various countries, including FIDE meetings in The Hague, Wiesbaden, Canterbury and Helsinki. It has been my constant aim to try to encourage and cultivate the practice and study of Fairy Chess and to keep alive the great legacy that T.R. Dawson left to the world when he died in 1951.

In recent years I have developed close relations with the younger generation of West German problemists, who are very active in Fairy Chess, centred round 29-year-old Bernd Ellinghoven, who helps Peter Kniest to edit Feenschach and who printed my last booklet, Fairy Chess Problems (1979), containing poems as well as problems, combined in a new kind of fairy technique, for I believe that Fairy Chess represents in many ways the ‘poetry’ of Chess.

FAIRY CHESS PrOblems (1979)
FAIRY CHESS PrOblems (1979)

For the 50th birthday of T. R. Dawson on the 28th November 1939 a certain Dr Lazarus of Budapest wrote in Fairy Chess Review: ‘T. R. D. these three letters represent a conception in the Poetry of Chess which is amongst the most ingenious of all its turns, one of its most strange and interesting phases… Without T.R.D. human culture would lack a factor in its development’. Those people (and there are some) who would banish Fairy Chess altogether from Caissa’s realm resemble the iron-hearted Mr. Gradgrinds who would abolish romance, mystery, poetry, invention, discovery and imagination from human life.

Fairy Chess Review
Fairy Chess Review

Elsewhere I have written: ‘The Game for Murderers, The Problem for Philosophers, Fairy Chess for Sufis’, because the aim of the game-player is to ‘mate’ (kill) the opponent (from Arabic, mat _ dead), while the problemist has no personal opponent to kill, but merely a philosophical problem to resolve. In Fairy Chess, however, the adept is transported to another plane of existence, to an ‘undiscovered country from whose bourne no traveller returns’,to new’dimensions’ of thought (as in 3- and 4-dimensional problems) – in short, to Fairyland, to Nirvana.

The three problems represent my early, middle and later compositions. The helpmate in three moves (Black plays first in a helpmate) is a miniature culminating in an ideal Mate. C. H. O’D. Alexander was much tickled by what he called ‘the deceptive pawn’ on a2, which unexpectedly does not promote.

The Construction Task with 113 White moves, all ‘maintaining’ the legal stalemate position in which Black finds himself, is a standing record that defeated the previous record of 112 such moves obtained independently by six problemists in six countries, one of them an lnternational Master of FIDE.

The Knight’s Tour is one of the oldest genres of Fairy Chess, dating from the earliest days of chess, and in TR Dawson’s Fairy Chess Review he published many of them., including some that showed the ‘square numbers’ (1,4,9,16,25,36,49,64) all on one rank – in the present example I have added the extra strict condition that as many as possible of the numbers 1 to 16 must be in the SW corner and as many as possible of the numbers 1 to 32 must be in the W half of the board.

For two reasons the perfect ideal in this task cannot be attained, firstly because of the given position of the number 25, and secondly because it is not possible to make a Knight’s tour on a 4 x 4 board in the SW corner.

Solutions :

1. Helpmate, Evening News, 20th February 1957 dedicated to Harold Lommer

Helpmate in 3 moves

1. Kd5 Nb1
2. Kc4 e8=Q
3. Kb3 Qb5 mate

2. Construction Task Record, Feenschach 9341 Sep/Oct 1969 dedicated to Karl Fabel

113 unforced stalemate maintenances with Promotion in Play (Pawn promotions count as 4 moves) unforced as W has some moves that do not maintain stalemate, so he is not ‘forced’ to maintain it.

3. Knight’s Tour Chessics 5(180) July, 1978 dedicated to D. Nixon.

Knights tour with
a) All square number on 4th rank
b) maximum of 1-16 in SW quad
c) maximum of 1-32 in W half

Knight's tour solution from ASM Dickins
Knight’s tour solution from ASM Dickins

From The Encyclopaedia of Chess (Batsford, 1977), Harry Golombek OBE, John Rice writes:

“British problemist, Founder of Q Press (1967) to publish books on fairy problems: A Guide to Fairy Chess (1967); An Album of Fairy Chess (1970); The Serieshelpmate (co-author, 1971). Has presented a large collection of problem books to Cambridge University Library. International Judge (1975).”

100 Classics of the Chessboard
100 Classics of the Chessboard
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Remembering Thomas Dawson (28-xi-1889 16-xii-1951)

We remember Thomas Dawson who passed away seventy years ago on Sunday, December 16th, 1951.

He was also known by the pseudonym T. Dyke Robinson (we are looking for a primary source for this)

Thomas Rayner Dawson was born on Thursday, November 28th 1889 in Leeds, Yorkshire to Henry and Jane Dawson (née Rayner).

The early history of TRD and his family has been meticulously researched by Yorkshire chess historian, Steve Mann. We recommend you visit this page to discover the detail.

According to Edward Winter in Chess Notes TRD lived at the following addresses :

  • 5 Clyde Road, Wallington, Surrey, England (Ranneforths Schachkalender, 1925, page 139)
  • 2 Lyndhurst Road, Thornton Heath, Surrey, England (Ranneforths Schach-Kalender, 1930, page 65).
  • 31 Clyde Road, Croydon, England (Fairy Chess Review, issues from 1946 to 1949*).

From The Oxford Companion to Chess (OUP, 1984 & 1996)by Hooper & Ken Whyld:

“English composer, pioneer of both fairy problems and retrograde analysis. His problems in these fields form the greater part of his output (about 6,500 compositions) and are better remembered than his studies and orthodox problems. For fairy problems he invented new pieces: grasshopper (1912) LEO (1912), NEUTRAL MAN (1912) NIGHT RIDER (1925), and VAO (1912); he codified new rules such as the maximummer (1913) and various kinds of series-mover; and he used unorthodox boards.

Thomas Rayner Dawson (28-xi-1889 16-xii-1951)
Thomas Dawson (28-xi-1889 16-xii-1951)

In 1915 he wrote Retrograde Analysis, the first book on the subject, completing the project begun several years earlier by the German composer Wolfgang Hundsdorfer (1879-1951).

Retrograde Analysis, Thomas Dawson & Hundsdorfer, 1915
Retrograde Analysis, Thomas Dawson & Hundsdorfer, 1915

From 1919 to 1930 Dawson conducted a column devoted to fairy problems in the Chess Amateur, In 1926 he was a co-founder of The Problemist , which he edited for its first six years and he founded and edited The Problemist Fairy Supplement (1931-6) continued as The Fairy Chess Review (1936-51).

Asymmetry, TR Dawson & Wolfgang Pauly, Chess Amateur, 1927
Asymmetry, TR Dawson & Wolfgang Pauly, Chess Amateur, 1927

Besides conducting columns in several newspapers and periodicals, one of them daily and one in the Braille Chess Magazine, Dawson edited the problem section of the British Chess Magazine from 1931 to 1951; he devised and published in its pages (1947-50) a systematic terminology for problem themes in the hope that it would supplant the extensive jargon then and now in use, Dawson wrote five hooks on fairy problems: Caissa’s Wild Roses (1935); C. M. Fox, His Problems (1936); Caissa’s Wild Roses in Clusters (1937); Ultimate Themes (1938); and Caissa’s Fairy Tales (1947).

Caissa's Wild Roses in Clusters, TR Dawson, Chess Amateur, 1937
Caissa’s Wild Roses in Clusters, TR Dawson, Chess Amateur, 1937

Charles Masson Fox (1866-1935) was a patron whose generosity made possible the publication of four of these books and the two fairy problem magazines founded by Dawson. Ultimate Themes deals with tasks, another of Dawson’s favourite subjects. In 1973 all five books were republished in one volume. Five Classics of Fairy Chess.

Five Classics of Fairy Chess, TR Dawson, Dover Publications Inc.; Revised edition (1 Sept. 1973)
Five Classics of Fairy Chess, TR Dawson, Dover Publications Inc.; Revised edition (1 Sept. 1973)

Dawson found it difficult to understand the problemist’s idea of beauty because it is not susceptible to precise definition. The artist talks of “quiet” moves, oblivious that they are White’s most pulverizing attacks! This aesthetic folly, reverence, response thrill to vain-glorious bombast runs throughout chess.(See Bohemian for a problem showing 16 model mates, a task Dawson claimed as a record but a setting Bohemian composers would reject.) His genius did not set him apart from his fellows; he could find time for casual visitors and would explain his ideas to a tyro with patience, modesty, and kindness. Although he won many tourney prizes much of his work was designed to encourage others, to enlarge the small band of fairy problem devotees, He composed less for fame than to amuse himself, confessing to another composer ‘We do these things for ourselves alone.’

Caissa's Fairy Tales, TR Dawson, Chess Amateur, 1947
Caissa’s Fairy Tales, TR Dawson, Chess Amateur, 1947

A chemistry graduate, Dawson took a post in the rubber industry in 1922 and rose to be head of the Intelligence Division of the British Rubber Manufacturer for which he founded, catalogued, and maintained a technical library. Unwell for the last year of his life, he died from a stroke. K. Fabel and C. E. Kemp, Schach ohne Grenzen or Chess unlimited (1969) is a survey, written in German and English, of Dawson’s contribution to the art of fairy problems.”

Thomas Rayner Dawson (28-XI-1889, 16-XII-1951)
Thomas Rayner Dawson (28-xi-1889 16-xii-1951)

From The Encyclopedia of Chess (Robert Hale 1970 & 1976), Anne Sunnucks :

“British problemist. Born on 28th November 1889. Died on 16th December 1951. Universally known as TRD., the great master of Fairy problems. His wealth of invention held the chess world enthralled. His output comprised about 6,400 problems and 150 studies.

Dawson was a nephew of the late James Rayner, himself a noted chess problemist . From as early as about 1910, TRD had conducted the ‘Chess Endings‘ section in the Chess Amateur, and its Fairy section from 1919. He worked with BG Laws from Mark 1930 conducting the problem pages of the British Chess Magazine, and following Laws’ death he assumed complete charge of the section from October 1931 to February 1951 when ill health forced him to relinquish the work.

Fairy Chess Review
Fairy Chess Review

The Problemist Fairy Chess Supplement subsequently renamed The Fairy Chess Review was started by TRD in August 1930. TRD was concerned in a number of other chess publications ; chess for the Blind, several books of the AC White Christmas series, BCPS Honours 1926-29, and the CM Fox series.

He was largely instrumental in the publication of the first issue of The Problemist on 1st January 1926, and was editor until May 1931. He was President of The British Chess Problem Society from September 1931 to 1943.

Ultimate Themes, TR Dawson, Chess Amateur, 1938
Ultimate Themes, TR Dawson, Chess Amateur, 1938

Apart from chess, Thomas Dawson, MSc, FRIC, FIRI was an international authority on rubber, and was responsible for the creation of the world-famous rubber library at Croydon, as well as its ‘Dawson’ system of rubber literature documentation. A Guide to Fairy Chess and The Problemist March 1952 detail the remarkable life-time accomplishments of TRD.”

From The Encyclopaedia of Chess (Batsford, 1977), Harry Golombek OBE, John Rice writes:

“British problemist, output over 6,000, 5,000+ being fairies . Dawson is remembered especially for his enormous contribution to fairy chess, of which he was the world’s leading exponent. Not only did he invent new pieces (e.g. Grasshopper, Nightrider) and new forms (e.g. Serieshelpmate), he also popularised fairy ideas with unparalleled enthusiasm through his writing and editing.

Books include Caissa’s Wild Roses (1935), Caissa’s Wild Roses in Clusters (1937), Ultimate Themes (1938), and Caissa’s Fairy Tales (1947);  and in collaboration Retrograde Analysis (1915) and Asymmetry (1928).

Editor of The Problemist (1922-31), fairy secretary of Chess Amateur (1919-30, Fairy Chess Review (previously Problemist Fairy Supplement) (1930-51) and problem pages of the British Chess Magazine (1931-51). Of these, the Fairy Chess Review was probably his greatest achievement.

President of British Chess Problem Society 1931-43.”

When TRD stepped down as Endings editor of British Chess Magazine in December 1947 he wrote this:

“With this page I reluctantly terminate on health grounds some forty years of work in the Endings field, and my contributions to this corner of the “British Chess Magazine”. To the many readers of these pages, a Merry Christmas and steadily improving years.”

He handed over his column to Richard Guy.

From British Chess Magazine, Volume LXXI (71, 1951), Number 3 (March) pp. 78-80 we have notice of the retirement of TRD written by Brian Reilly:

WITH the retirement of Mr. T. R. Dawson a wonderful chapter in the history of the “B.C.M.” is brought to a close. It is a profound truism that in England the Chess Problem has never possessed such an assiduous and devoted servant and although Mr. Dawson had already attained greatness when he joined us, the story of the Past twenty years is one of unparalleled intensive activity in which the ontological essays on “Systematic Terminology” may be considered the crowning
achievement of a unique career.

His immense influence in the realm of Fairy Chess is well known; indeed, when the next instalment in the history
of the subject comes to be written it will be mainly that of our own Colossus with his countless converts finding, not dishonourable graves, but new and entrancing visions of beautiful things made possible through him. The onus probandi of his contribution to the orthodox problem, as treated in the “‘B.C.M.,” lies with posterity and in the minds of men unencumbered by prejudice and receptive to new and startling ideas.

In this Editorial we can only say, on behalf of our many readers,

“Thank you, T. R. D., for everything that you have done: for your devotion to your cause and your inspiration to your fellows. It has been a privilege to be associated with you and in the well-deserved years of retirement may your days and those of your loved ones, be long, fruitful, and full of the greatest happiness.”

In the nature of things we must go on and in bidding. a reluctant farewell to the magic name of T. R. D. we welcome to Problem World the young and and enthusiastic Mr. S. Sedgwick. His first article, dealing with the work of T. R. D., appears overleaf, and we commend it to all our readers.

Here is that editorial as it originally appeared:

British Chess Magazine, Volume LXX1 (71, 1951), Number 3 (March) p8 77 - 80.
British Chess Magazine, Volume LXX1 (71, 1951), Number 3 (March) pp. 77 – 80.

Following that we have this appreciation from the incoming Problem Editor, Stanley Sedgwick of 337 Strone Road, Manor Park, London E12:

RETIREMENT OF MR. T. R. DAWSON

The news that Mr. Dawson, through reasons of health, has to relinquish these pages will be received with a deep and universal regret.

In the T. R. D. Diamond Jubilee booklet, 1949, the Editor was constrained to remark that so far as Fairy Chess Review was concerned there were no signs of Mr. Dawson retiring to that otium cum dignitate which was unquestionably his due; for the “B.C.M.” that prophecy is now unfortunately fulfilled. I might well have called this article “Twenty Glorious Years,” for in that time he has poured forth from these pages, in a never ending stream, the
treasures of a unique creative mind that makes the lot of any successor in unenviable one. As befits the occasion this issue is devoted to T. R. D. and I have to thank the many kind friends who at short notice have joined me in this tribute.

Thomas Rayner Dawson, M.Sc., F.I.C., F.I.R.I.. was born on November 29th, 1889, in Leeds, Yorkshire. He was a nephew of the late James Rayner, who edited these pages from 1889 until his death in 1898. A study of the “B.C.M.” for those years reveals a man whose love for the bizarre and unorthodox far outstrips any regard for the conventional. Bearing in mind Mr. Dawson’s subsequent pre-eminence in Fairy Chess it can be truly said that he was nurtured in the correct Puck-like atmosphere and to use his own words: “l cut my teeth on some of his old round-headed pawns!”

By the year 1900 he had already assimilated the rules of the game from a book of boy’s pastimes and evidenced an interest, in local newspaper columns, The Leeds Mercury Supplement and Yorkshire Weekly Post. His first problem – a direct mate in two – fell under the solvers’ scrutiny in 1907 and within a short period, which saw further orthodox work, he had soon acquired technique and absorbed current tenets, jargon, dogma, and dicta. – His attraction for the unorthodox was fostered primarily by his relationship to James Rayner, by the Christmas issues of the Leeds Mercury Supplement, and three works Tolosa y Carreras’ Traite Analytique, Alexandre’s Beautes, and Samuel Loyd in American Chess Nuts.

Through these agencies developed a love of Fairy Chess which was later to be the single and enduring passion of his life.
The year 1909 saw him in charge of the Endings Section of the Chess Amateur and later in the same magazine the famous Fairy Corner. In l915 at the invitation of Mr. Alain White he joined with W. Hundsdorfer in an epoch making pioneer work Retrograde Analysis, a strange and beautiful field in which he had proved himself peculiarly facile. In 1922 he founded and edited with conspicuous success The Problemist, the bi-monthly journal of the British Chess Problem Society.

This important work continued until 1931 when he relinquished the Editorship to Mr. C. S. Kipping and commenced the editing of an unknown and delicate newcomer, The Problemist Fairy Supplement. Although the Fairies had been claiming his attention more and more, Mr. Dawson discharged his position as the Society’s Editor with characteristic thoroughness, ever ready to support its tourneys with his own work and the pages of its journal with theoretical articles, demonstrating that his true passion had in no way impaired a marked ability for orthodox technique.

Nineteen-thirty-one, which saw the first small beginnings of The Problemist Fairy Supplement (later to be known as Fairy Chess Review), was to prove a milestone in the history of Fairy Chess. From its pages Fairy Chess as preached by T. R. D. went out to all lands, Penetrating every barrier, enrolling new adherents, and carried onwards and
upwards by the magnificent enthusiasm of his greatest disciple and guiding star.

His unique ability to interpret the infinite new forms of Fairy Chess, which a fertile imagination made readily available, had already gained renown and by this time his pre-eminence was firmly established, founded on problems and articles scattered in countless magazines and journals throughout the world. The message of his work and personality was, for many serious minds, too strong to be resisted, and in his devotion to Fairy Chess Mr. Dawson stands as the architect who laid the foundations for all the undreamt glories and beauties that are to come.

He joined the “8.C.M.” in 1930 and became the Problem Editor in 1931, upon the death of B. G. Laws; he was later made responsible for the well-known Endings feature. To these pages Mr. Dawson brought a rare literary ability and a scientific single-mindedness of purpose that for many years has made him unique in chess journalism.

In 1933, with an article on pawn switch modes, he lit a tiny flame that burned and has gone on burning, illuminating one of the most complete investigations into any problem theme. In this article, small but very significant in itself, is mirrored Mr. Dawson’s insistence upon the scientific and methodical approach to all problem work.

The same sincere belief that order and method are indispensable to any progress in the chess problem resulted fifteen years later in the historical essays on Systematic Terminology – one of the most remarkable contributions to pure thought on the problem domain yet conceived. The desire to bring order out of chaos has led him over the period of years to collect 100,000 Fairy Chess problems in a classified. system, a unique compilation with each individual member precisely assigned its place in the chess cosmos. His philosophy is, perhaps, best exemplified by his closing remarks to the Systematic Terminology essays, in which he states that with the assistance of orderly terminology “chess problem study is lifted far out of the morass of confusion of inspiration, into the freedom and dignity of an exact geometrical science.” It will not
have escaped attention that despite this uncompromising rejection of the artistic nature of the chess problem, Mr. Dawson’s best work, both orthodox and fairy, is the very embodiment of everything that good work should be. Pointed like an arrow,
complete and final as to the idea depicted, great regard paid to economy, the best attributes are ever present and there are many students of themes who have had occasion to profit from the clarity of his constructive powers.

The 1930’s saw great activity in the publication of the important Fairy Chess books, Caissa’s Wild Roses (1935), Caissa’s Wild Roses in Clusters (1937), and Ultimate Themes (1938). In each one a complex subject was treated in a thoroughly scientific manner. Broadly speaking these three works summarized Fairy Chess to date, demonstrating
its great achievements with crystal clarity. A close study of these books reveals the whole magnificent sweep of a unique intellect, at the same time showing how many of these achievements were really due to him. ln 1936 he gave to Fairy Chess lovers C. M. Fox, His Problems, a tribute to his great friend. His other literary works include the truly delightful Caissa’s Fairy Tales, which, with Sam Loyd and his Chess Problems shares the honour of being the only two problem books to be translated from the English language. Fata Morgana (1922), in conjunction with Dr. Birgfeld, W. Nanz,W. Massmann and W. Pauly, dealt with over 800 self mates and here Mr. Dawson’s Symbolic Notation was the binding thread in a masterly book. Asymmetry, with W. Pauly was published in 1928 and remains the classic exposition of afield to which he has devoted considerable attention.

In addition to his work for the “B.C.M.,” Mr. Dawson has at various times been responsible for the Problem Department of Eco degli Scacchi, The Half Hour, L’Alfiere di Re, the London Evening Standard, and the
Braille Chess Magazine, the last named an unremitting labour of love that continued for thirteen years. He also assisted in the inauguration of the annual British Chess Federation Award Pamphlets and edited them for three years. As a mark of great respect for his work he was elected President of the British Chess Problem Society in 1931 and remained constantly in that office until 1943.

A study of Mr. Dawson’s output is truly impressive and includes, inter alia, 5302 Fairies, 885 direct mates, 97 self mates and 138 endings, of which 110 Fairies have gained prizes with 89 Hon. Mentions and 75 commendations; in the other group 10 have been awarded prizes, with 47 Hon. Mentions and commendations. A composer’s contribution to any particular domain cannot and must not be judged by reference to tourney results alone, but in these achievements the First Prize Essay, L’Echiquier, 1928, and the treatise on Pawn Promotions, British Chess Federation, 1936, highlight a brilliant career.

Mr. Dawson has thus run the entire gamut and experience of composition ever revealing himself both in his work and writings as a seeker of essential truths and beauties, endowed with the ability to pass his discoveries on to others so that their wonders may be shared, enjoyed, and carried forward. He was kind enough to make a personal selection from his problems to round off this article and from these I have chosen six.

Many composers have expressed a desire to be associated with this small, but quite inadequate, tribute to his genius and many problems have been contributed for this purpose, some of which appear in this issue and others will follow. With each
and every one has come a warm personal message of esteem for our retiring Editor, coupled with the sincere hope that time and rest will repair the harm left by the past years of unremitting labour. That this event is not too long delayed is the fervent wish of us all.

Six of Mr. Dawson’s problems follow –

No. 1
British Chess Magazine, January, 1951

White mates in 2

No. 2
Good Companion Chess Problem Club, March, 1922

White mates in 3

No. 3
British Chess Magazine, September, 1937

White mates in 3

No. 4
Bolton Football Field, March 9th, 1913

White mates in 3

No. 5
The Field, September 14th, 1946

White mates in 4

No. 6
British Chess Federation Awards, 1943

White mates in 7

and here follows the original article:

British Chess Magazine, Volume LXX1 (71, 1951), Number 3 (March) p8 77 - 80.
British Chess Magazine, Volume LXX1 (71, 1951), Number 3 (March) pp. 77 – 80.
British Chess Magazine, Volume LXX1 (71, 1951), Number 3 (March) p8 77 - 80.
British Chess Magazine, Volume LXX1 (71, 1951), Number 3 (March) pp. 77 – 80.
British Chess Magazine, Volume LXX1 (71, 1951), Number 3 (March) p8 77 - 80.
British Chess Magazine, Volume LXX1 (71, 1951), Number 3 (March) pp. 77 – 80.

Unfortunately TRD was to pass away not much more than a year after the retirement notice and in British Chess Magazine, Volume LXXII (72, 1952), Number 4 (April) pp. 107 – 108 we have this obituary also from Stanley Sedgwick :

British Chess Magazine, Volume LXXII (72, 1952), Number 4 (April) pp. 107 - 108
British Chess Magazine, Volume LXXII (72, 1952), Number 4 (April) pp. 107 – 108
British Chess Magazine, Volume LXXII (72, 1952), Number 4 (April) pp. 107 - 108
British Chess Magazine, Volume LXXII (72, 1952), Number 4 (April) pp. 107 – 108

The same obituary contains the following appreciation by Gerald Abrahams :

British Chess Magazine, Volume LXXII (72, 1952), Number 4 (April) pp. 107 - 108
British Chess Magazine, Volume LXXII (72, 1952), Number 4 (April) pp. 107 – 108

According to Edward Winter in Chess Explorations (Cadogan Chess, 1996) page 106, Chess Note 457, :

“George Jellis suspects that a chess man has been named after a street:

Just south of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London is a private gated road called Nightrider Street which, I believe belongs to the Post Office and presumably derives its name from the night mail coaches of earlier days. It is only a short walk from the St. Bride’s Institute, where the British Chess Problem Society has held its meetings since its foundation in 1918. Among the founder members was TR Dawson, who published his first Nightrider problem in 1925.

Knightrider Street, EC4
Knightrider Street, EC4

From Wikipedia :

“Thomas Rayner Dawson (28 November 1889 – 16 December 1951) was an English chess problemist and is acknowledged as “the father of Fairy Chess”.[1] He invented many fairy pieces and new conditions. He introduced the popular fairy pieces grasshopper, nightrider, and many other fairy chess ideas.

Dawson published his first problem, a two-mover, in 1907. His chess problem compositions include 5,320 fairies, 885 directmates, 97 selfmates, and 138 endings. 120 of his problems have been awarded prizes and 211 honourably mentioned or otherwise commended. He cooperated in chess composition with Charles Masson Fox.

Dawson was founder-editor (1922–1931) of The Problemist, the journal of the British Chess Problem Society. He subsequently produced The Fairy Chess Review (1930–1951), which began as The Problemist Fairy Chess Supplement. At the same time he edited the problem pages of The British Chess Magazine (1931–1951).

Publications

Caissa’s Playthings a series of articles in Cheltenham Examiner (1913)
Retrograde Analysis, with Wolfgang Hundsdorfer (1915)
Fata Morgana, with Birgfeld, Nanz, Massmann, Pauly (1922)
Asymmetry, with W. Pauly (1928)
Seventy Five Retros (1928)
Caissa’s Wild Roses (1935)
C. M. Fox, His Problems (1936)
Caissa’s Wild Roses in Clusters (1937)
Ultimate Themes (1938)
Caissa’s Fairy Tales (1947)
The last five titles were collected as Five Classics of Fairy Chess, Dover Publications (1973), ISBN 978-0-486-22910-2.”

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