“International Grandmaster Andrew Soltis brings you a foolproof guide to choosing your best next chess move, every time.
There are more than 20 moves you can choose from an average position, yet Chess Masters regularly manage to select the best moves – and they do it faster, more confidently and with less calculation than other players.
This practical guide, in a fully revised and updated edition of a Batsford chess classic, explains the tricks, techniques and shortcuts Masters employ to find the best way forward, at every stage of a game. Drawing on the wisdom of some of the greatest chess players of all time, with analysis from over 180 games, it covers:
• Employing specific cues to identify good moves.
• Streamlining analysis of the consequences of moves.
• Using both objective and highly subjective criteria to find the right move – from any position.
This invaluable book provides a fascinating insight into the way Chess Masters think, and is a must for all players who want to hone their decision-making skills and cultivate a killer chess instinct.”
About the Author (updated from the publisher’s website):
“Andrew Soltis is an International Grandmaster, a chess correspondent for the New York Post and a highly popular chess writer. He is the author of many books including 500 Chess Questions Answered, The Chessmaster Checklist, How to Choose a Chess Move and How to Swindle in Chess. He lives in New York.”
At one level, the game of chess is all about decision making. At (almost) every move we have a choice to make. There may be 20, 30 or 40 possible moves. Sometimes many moves will be of equal value, but on other occasions there may be only one move to win, or draw, the game.
Decision making has two stages, involving breadth and depth of vision. What are my choices? What will happen next? While computers have no trouble considering every possible legal move in a position, humans will get very confused if they try to consider too many.
The ability to make decisions rather than just relying on instinct is what makes us human. We all have decisions to make every day of our life.
Many of them will be trivial: what topping should I have on my pizza? But others may be life-changing. Should I invite this girl out for a date? Should I accept this job offer? Should I buy this house?
Or, as Soltis opens this book:
Making a decision is one of life’s basic skills. Good decisions bring us almost everything we hold valuable. Bad decisions cost us friendships, time, money and mental ease.
Schools don’t teach us how to make good decisions. But chess can. Some of the first difficult choices we make in life are at a chessboard.
Actually, I’m not sure that schools don’t teach decision making. At least in my part of the world, when children act inappropriately their teacher will often tell them they made a poor decision.
At another level, though, chess is, far more than most skills, knowledge dependent. Which is why most books are, either directly or indirectly, concerned with adding to their readers’ chess knowledge base.
Perhaps the first book about decision making over the chessboard was Kotov’s seminal Think Like a Grandmaster. I read this back in the early 1970s and found it very helpful in getting me to think about thinking, and, in doing so, to cut down on the number of avoidable blunders in my games.
Kotov’s book has also been subjected to much criticism, and, up to a point, quite rightly so. Different players will think in different ways, and different positions require different methods of thinking.
Soltis’s book might be seen as both an expansion and a corrective. If you’re looking for a book which teaches you how to think rather than what to think about, which improves your thinking processes rather than providing you with even more chess knowledge, it might be ideal for you.
This is a completely revised and updated edition of a book first published in 2005. Many of the examples come from more recent games, so, even if you have the earlier version you might want to consider this.
Soltis has long been one of my favourite chess authors, combining readability and a story-telling style of annotation with just the right amount of analysis. Not for him the excesses and colourful metaphors of some authors (not naming names, but you know who I mean), nor the reams of computer generated variations preferred by many younger writers.
As I haven’t read the earlier edition, I was eager to look inside.
Soltis covers a lot of ground in 200 pages. We have 16 chapters, each looking at a different aspect of making decisions over the board.
Let’s whizz through them quickly.
Chapter 1. It’s Your Move. We learn that there are two types of candidate move: those that improve your position according to ‘general principles’ and those of a tactical nature: Checks, Captures and Threats.
Chapter 2. Look Smart. We have to develop excellent chessboard vision so that we can immediately identify all forcing moves, both for us and for our opponent. As Magnus said: “Always look for captures and checks, kids.”
Chapter 3: Quiet Cues. Then we have to learn how to look for positional candidates, and how to visualise where you want your pieces to end up.
Chapter 4: Drawback Detective. Another way to find candidate moves is to consider the possible drawbacks of your opponent’s last move.
Here’s a simple example (Lagno – Ju Wenjun 2018).
Here, Black is threatening Rxg3+ but 1. Be1 exf4 is crushing and 1. Rf3 invites e4 (the computer prefers the difficult to spot h5). Not liking those options, she chose 1. Kh1 instead. Ju noticed the drawback of that move, putting the king on the vulnerable long diagonal, so played 1… Bc8 followed by Bb7+, winning quickly. White did have a defence in 1. Qh5, a move which has no drawbacks.
Chapter 5: Mini-Phases. Splitting a game into opening, middlegame and ending is often over-simplistic. We can think in terms of phases such as ‘late opening’ or ‘late middlegame’ which will make it easier to make decisions and find candidate moves.
Chapter 6: Mars Moves, Venus Moves. Tactics are from Mars, strategy is from Venus, but they’re not separate: ideally a good move will have both tactical and strategic aims. However, it’s easy to think of a move purely as being positional and, as a result, miss a tactic.
Chapter 7: Intuition. Strong players will often use intuition when selecting the best move. But, as Soltis warns: Sorry, but there is no easy way to acquire it. Gaining experience and the study of master games are the proven methods.
Chapter 8: Trees. We’re in Kotov territory here as we look at the concept of analysis trees.
Chapter 9: How Much Analysis?. How far along the branch of an analysis tree should you analyse? Until you run out of forcing moves: again, something explained by Kotov.
In this position (Karpov – Antunes Tilburg 1994), Black missed a golden opportunity to defeat his legendary opponent.
Antunes played 1… Bf8 here and soon lost. After the game the players were asked if they had considered 1… b3, threatening Nb4 as well as bxc2. Karpov hadn’t seen it at all, but Antunes had rejected it because of 2. Rc8 bxa2 3. Rxd8+ Rxd8 4. Qxa5, missing that 3… Bxd8 protects a5 and the a-pawn promotes.
Chapter 10: Evaluating. When we run out of forcing moves we have to evaluate the resulting position. This requires experience along with great endgame knowledge. Soltis: Suppose you can accurately look two moves into the future. What would help you improve more? Being able to see three moves ahead? Or being able to properly evaluate what you see two moves ahead? For most players, the answer is the latter.
Chapter 11: Tree Tweaking. Sometimes you have the right idea but have to reverse the move order to get it to work, perhaps using a zwischenzug.
Chapter 12: The Four Thinking Models. These are Prioritise: focus on one candidate move and play it if it seems to work, Think Like a Kotov, using the techniques recommended in Think Like a Grandmaster, Eliminate (judge options by their drawbacks and discard accordingly) and Back and Forth, switching from one move to another, scorned by Kotov but it can sometimes work.
Chapter 13: Reality Check. Before you play a move ask yourself the question “Why did you pick that move?” Every move must have a purpose rather than just ‘looking good’. As Soltis points out, bad moves decide many more games than so-called “best” moves.
Chapter 14: The Pragmatic Imperative. Be pragmatic: choose the simplest move rather than something that might be stronger but will be harder to play. Make sure you find a good move rather than trying to find the best move.
Soltis makes a contrast between Tal, who was always happy to plunge into unclear complications, with Fischer, who took a much more pragmatic approach, preferring clear lines whenever possible.
This is from Fischer-Bisguier (US Championship 1963-64 – not 1962-63 as mistakenly given in the book). A normal move for White would be 1. a4, but Fischer preferred the pawn sacrifice 1. Nd5, which Bisguier immediately declined, remarking after the game that Fischer doesn’t make unsound sacrifices. The position had the sacrifice been accepted might not be clear to you, but it was certainly clear to Fischer. The computer considers 1. a4 and 1. Nd5 to be of equal merit.
Chapter 15: Clock Mastery. You also need to be pragmatic in allocating your time, something increasingly important with today’s faster time limits. Running into time trouble will lead to anxiety, confusion and panic.
Chapter 16: Blunder Check. The final piece of advice, again as recommended by Kotov: before you make your move the last thing you do is check that you’re not making a crude blunder.
Each chapter concludes with some helpful ‘takeaways’: quick lessons you can use in your own games. Reading these before your next tournament may well be beneficial.
You’ll see that there’s a lot of material to get your teeth into here. The examples in each chapter have been expertly chosen: they are all both entertaining and instructive, with explanations in Soltis’s typically lucid style.
If you like this author’s work, and you’re interested in the subject matter, you won’t be disappointed. Although all players will get something out of it, I’d consider the book most suitable for serious competitive players from, say, 1500 up to 2000 strength.
Like all Batsford books, it is excellently produced, but looks rather old-fashioned. If you’re my age you’ll be only too happy with this. Other readers might prefer, for example, opportunities for active learning and reader participation rather than just being lectured at. Some publishers would, no doubt, have prefaced each chapter with a page of puzzles based on the positions on the following pages. You might or might not prefer this approach.
An excellent book on an important topic, then, and, if you’re interested in the decision making aspect of chess, which you certainly should be, it can be highly recommended.
Once a chess player has learned not to drop pieces, that innate feeling of not wanting to sacrifice them willingly takes place in our consciousness. Why should give up our pieces unless we must? This book tries to remedy that thinking pattern by introducing the student and reader to the concept of imagination. For the purpose of expanding the imagination, the author has created sixty examples of varying degrees of difficulty to illustrate tactical and mating patterns of many kinds.
Lastly, the author has put together a long list of do’s and do not’s under the umbrella of “Chess Maxims” for beginners and inexperienced players.
Last year I wrote a trilogy of pieces about the fascinating Charles Dealtry Locock, who had a long and varied career as a player, problemist, writer and, towards the end of his long life, teacher.
Locock was in many ways a man ahead of his time, a pioneering supporter of girls’ chess with a belief that composed positions have much value in chess teaching.
These days most reputable chess teachers advocate the solving of endgame studies as an excellent way to develop your creativity and imagination, and many also recommend solving composed problems as well.
Here’s Locock in his introduction to Imagination in Chess, first published in 1937:
Up to a point, I agree. My experience has always been that young pupils learn how to checkmate with two rooks and don’t bother with anything else, trading everything off to reach something they know, and missing quicker mates along the way.
I would disagree, however, that ‘frequently the only way to do this is to lose pieces on purpose’. Occasionally, yes, but not very often. Looking at Locock’s games, and at many others from the late 19th century when he was active as a competitive player, I also find many examples of unsound sacrifices.
So, while I’m in favour of introducing pupils to a wide variety of mates, and in developing their imagination, I’m also wary of being too obsessed with sacrifices at the expense of more general calculation.
Here we have 60 positions which are somewhere between positions from play and problems in that they use problem themes to illustrate mates which may arise over the board.
They are presented one to a page, using computer graphic diagrams, with smaller diagrams being used within the solutions.
This is Q29, which will give you a good idea of the sort of position you’ll find in this book.
It’s a mate in 3 (although Black would probably resign if you took the queen with your rook instead): I’m sure you can find the first move and all the variations yourself.
As the book proceeds, the positions get harder. Here’s Q55, a difficult mate in 4.
The (far from obvious) first move is Ke2, stepping aside from a potential pin on the f-file. There are (unmentioned) alternatives which also lead to mate, but take longer to achieve their aim.
I suppose you’re learning two things from these puzzles. Each one requires knowledge of standard mating patterns, but you also need to use your imagination in order to set them up.
It’s a rather unusual method of teaching chess, but it serves two purposes at once and many readers might well find working through the book helpful.
Then, as a bonus, we have the contents of another, very brief, book: One Hundred Chess Maxims For Beginners and Moderate Players, first published in 1935.
There’s an extra bonus: there are actually 103 maxims rather than the promised 100, not to mention 8 “don’ts” for beginners.
While most of them are unobjectionable, a few are decidedly odd.
Don’t No. 4 will be unpopular with devotees of the London System.
Don’t play your c1-bishop to f4. It has no attacking force there, is probably undefended, and liable to attack by queen or knight.
Maxim 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.
Maxim 38:
An attack on a well defended castled king must usually conclude with the sacrifice of a piece.
I always thought the object of the game was to mate as certainly as possible, not as quickly as possible. I think these two maxims, for me, sum up the deficiencies in Locock’s approach to chess.
Yes, you need to excel at calculation, but sacrifices and mates are only a very small part of calculation. Even today there are many chess teachers who fail to understand this.
While the puzzles themselves are well worth solving, here in 2025, the book has mostly curiosity value. Nevertheless, it’s great that it’s available in a well produced modern edition.
Carsten Hansen should be congratulated and thanked for his efforts in making Locock’s writings available to today’s readers.
Unless you’re interested in British chess in the first four decades of the last century you might not have heard of Reginald Pryce Michell (1873-1938).
Carsten Hansen hadn’t heard of him either, until he came across a collection of his best games written by Julius du Mont and first published in 1947. Acknowledgement was given to LW Barden, who read the proofs: and, of course, he’s still writing about chess 78 years later.
Michell was one of England’s leading players for several decades, and, in the 1920s and 1930s, a regular participant in the British Championship and Hastings, along with other seaside holiday tournaments. Back in those days at Hastings and elsewhere, the top section would comprise a couple of world class players, a few minor European masters, some of England’s top exponents and perhaps one or two enthusiastic amateurs, so Michell was able to cross swords with many of the greats of his day.
He had draws to his credit against four world champions, Capablanca, Alekhine, Euwe and Botvinnik, as well as wins against the likes of Bogoljubov, Sultan Khan, Réti and most of the top British players from Blackburne via Atkins and Yates through to Alexander and Golombek, all of whom feature in these pages. I’d consider this a record that almost anyone could be proud of. EdoChess has him at over 2300 for more than 40 years and above 2400 in the early years of the last century.
Carsten Hansen thought it worthwhile to investigate further. Here we have a handsome hardback (there’s also a paperback edition which contains rather less material) comprising many of his best games, along with a biography and other material.
I may well write much more about Michell at some point in the future, as he was a member of Kingston Chess Club and lived in my part of the world, but for now I’ll tell you a bit more about the book.
We start with a brief biography written by du Mont, but including a tribute from one of his contemporaries, EG Sergeant: well worth reading to give you an idea of the man behind the moves. Then we have 36 original games from du Mont’s book. His, rather shallow and inaccurate in places, annotations have been retained, but Hansen has added his own annotations based on current opening theory and computer analysis. For me, the most interesting aspect of the book is the comparison between the two sets of notes, demonstrating just how much chess has changed over the past 80 years.
Following that, there are another 36 games, annotated by Hansen, the last five of which don’t appear in the (earlier) paperback edition, along with another new feature: 36 puzzles based on the games in the book.
The author helpfully provides indexes of openings, ECO codes and players at the back of the book.
Michell was a quiet and studious man who played, for the most part, quiet and studious chess. Although the games in this book are all of interest, you won’t see all that much in the way of brilliant sacrificial attacks.
Du Mont judged this game, a victory with the black pieces against a future world championship candidate, perhaps his finest performance. Click on any move for a pop-up window.
Back in 1947 there were comments about what Michell had done to deserve a games collection, when many much stronger players hadn’t been honoured in that way. You might think they had, and still have, a point: if so I’d advise you to go away and write some of the missing books yourself. Michell, like many quiet people, had hidden depths.
I know there are many chess book enthusiasts who enjoy games collections of this type. If you fall into this category, or if you have an interest in British chess from that period, you won’t want to miss this well produced book. There are quite a few typos, but that probably won’t concern you very much.
Carsten Hansen should be congratulated for bringing du Mont’s original book back into print, and for his invaluable updates and additions. If what you’ve read about Michell has piqued your interest, don’t hesitate – and go for the hardcover version with the additional material.
You can read more about Michell and see some of his other games in this excellent article by Neil Blackburn.
R. P. Michell – A Master of British Chess: A forgotten chess master, Carsten Hansen and Julius du Mont, Publisher : CarstenChess (16 Mar. 2024), ISBN-13 : 978-8793812888
“The Sicilian Scheveningen Defense is a highly respected and flexible variation of the Sicilian Defense, characterized by the pawn structure Black adopts with pawns on e6 and d6. It arises after the moves 1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 e6. This setup allows Black to maintain a solid central presence while keeping options open for dynamic counterplay.”
About the Author:
“Grandmaster Daniel Gormally is currently living in Alnwick, Northumberland, England.
Danny has been a chess professional for over twenty years, in which time he has played in many tournaments both in the U.K. and abroad. He has represented England in the European team championships and the Olympiad. He has taken a high placing in the British chess championships and on several occasions has been placed in a tie for second. He is also the two times winner of the English rapid play championships.
In 2005 he scored his final Grandmaster norm in a tournament in Gibraltar, where he scored a 2693 performance. In that tournament he played against several world-class grandmasters, including Nakamura, Aronian, Sutovsky and Dreev, and only lost one game.
He is also the author of several well-received chess books, including “A Year in the Chess World” and “Mating the Castled King”, one of the few western chess books in recent years to be translated into Chinese.
As an author he is known for his laid-back and humorous style, this is his fourth book for Thinkers Publishing.”
GM Danny Gormally
This book is divided into eighteen chapters:
Chapter 1 – Tabiyas
Chapter 2 – The Chess Detective
Chapter 3 – A historical perspective
Chapter 4 – Kasparov vs Anand 1995
Chapter 5 – Engine analysis
Chapter 6 – Training games vs the engine
Chapter 7 – Chef’s recommendations
Chapter 8 – Turbo calculation
Chapter 9 – Defusing the most dangerous lines
Chapter 10 – Evaluations
Chapter 11 – Scheveningen Problems
Chapter 12 – Online adventures in the Scheveningen
Chapter 13 – 6.Bg5
Chapter 14 – Keres vs Nakamura
Chapter 15 – Delving deeper
Chapter 16 – Pawn breaks/structures
Chapter 17 – Tips for playing the Scheveningen
Chapter 18 – Exercises
The Scheveningen is not a trendy variation but there are a number of elite level players who have been proponents of this Sicilian variation such as Garry Kasparov and the current World Champion Gukesh Dommaraju.
The author, Danny Gormally explains in the Introduction section that “this isn’t your average chess book and I don’t sift through each and every variation and line in the typical way of most openings tomes, partly because I don’t find such opening books particularly enjoyable to read so have no desire to inflict them on the reader either”.
This book is therefore not a theoretical treatise on the trendy theory or otherwise of the Scheveningen Sicilian. There is some theory but there is not a dense thicket of complex, variations chapter after chapter. The author aims to explain the typical ideas, plans and pawn structures in this opening: in this he largely succeeds.
Danny also gives general advice on how to study an opening and on how to improve at chess. He obviously advocates the use of strong chess engines but stresses that over reliance on engine preparation without understanding, learning how to calculate and evaluate is harmful.
Chapter 1
This is a short chapter that introduces a couple of key positions in the Scheveningen: here is one from the Classical variation:
Scheveningen Classical Tabiya
The modern way to play this position is 9…e5 which equalises: the explanation given by the author is logical and illuminating. The older, more traditional move 9…Bd7 is a perfectly acceptable alternative which is covered in Chapter 7.
In the chapter summary, the author gives some sensible advice:
“play some training games from that position, perhaps against the computer or against a training partner. Study the position on Chessbase or some other kind of program…. That way you get a feel for the most familiar and most important positions in that opening variation. But it must be said, though, that there is no substitute for practical experience…. you analyse those games afterwards – the trail-and-error advantage of that is quite huge.”
Chapter 2
This section is a key chapter where the author gives general advice on studying positions:
Why has my opponent played that move?
What possible plans do I have in this position?
If I concretely play A, how is my opponent going to respond?
Seven exciting and didactic games from the Scheveningen are analysed with an emphasis on the opening/early middlegame plans for both sides. Five of these are in the Classical line, one in the English Attack, one in the dangerous f4/Be3/Qf3 or g4 line.
Classical Variation
Bezgodov – Andreikin Chelyabinsk 2018 after 14.Rae1
This position is discussed at length with the plans for both sides considered. The game continued 14…Rad8 15. Kh1 Bc6 16.Bd3 Qd7
Bezgodov – Andreikin after 16…Qd7 Chelyabinsk 2019
This is a typical position from the Classical variation. White played the tempting 17.Qh3?! eyeing 18.e5 but black has a typical counter 17…e5! (“you should always have the central breaks on your radar”) and Black is slightly better and went on to win a good positional game in the ending.
Here is another typical tabiya from the Classical variation.
Heberla – Moranda after 16…Re8 Polish Championships 2021
White played 17.Nd1!? which is the computer’s top suggestion. The plan and its resulting ideas and positions are discussed by the author which is instructive. 17…Bd8! was played and is a deft manoeuvre neutralising white’s attacking ideas.
Matlakov – Pichot after 17.Nd1 Bullet game Chess.com 2020
Here Black played the tempting 17…d5? (instead of the patient 17…Bd8) 18.Bxf6! Bxf6 19.e5 with a winning game: buy the book to see the denouement.
English Attack
Black has just responded 9…d5 after White’s queenside castling.
English Attack Vallejo Pons Francisco vs Anand Vishy
From the author: “A typical liberating central break, and it is my belief that this is the most reliable equaliser in this variation.”
Danny discusses the two major branches here:
A. 10.exd5 Nxd5! 11.Nxd5 Qxd5 12.c4 Qd6!=
B. 10.Qe1 e5! 11.Nxc6 bxc6 12.exd5
Here is another dangerous White system that can be defanged with a little detective work:
Ghinda – Espig Naleczow 1979
White can play two very aggressive moves which are dealt with in the same way:
8.Qf3 e5!
Ghinda-Espig Variation 8.Qf3 e5
9.Nf5!? (9.Nb3?! Bg4! 10. Qf2 d5! opening up the game as white has lost time with his queen) 9…Bxf5 (removing a piece that has moved 3 times) 10.exf5 Nbd7= Black has excellent development with Rc8 to follow.
8.g4 e5!
Ghinda-Espig 8.g4 e5
The central strike completely disrupts White’s attacking build-up. 9.Nf5 Bxf5 (removing the dangerous knight that has moved 3 times) 10.gxf5
Ghinda-Espig Variation Position after 10.gxf5
Superficially, this position looks good for white with the half open g-file, bishop pair and more space: he only needs to play Qf3, 0-0-0 and Rg1 with an excellent position. However, Black is well developed, is to move, and has two excellent plans.
A. 10…Nbd7 11.Qf3 Rc8 (already eyeing up an exchange sacrifice on c3)
B. 10…exf4 11.Bxf4 Qb6! (A lovely disruptive move eyeing the weak dark squares and exploiting White’s lack of development, a typical idea in many openings particularly in the Sicilian) 12.Qd2 Qxb2 13. Rb1 Qa3 unclear
Taking Danny’s general advice here, the reader should analyse this unclear position on their own and evaluate the resulting positions. Use the engine to check your work but don’t use the engine as a crutch all the time which can lead to laziness.
Chapter 3 – A historical perspective
The author puts the opening into its historical context citing Max Euwe as one of the major developers of the Scheveningen. Paul Keres’ 6.g4 is introduced with a crushing win by Keres over Efim Bogoljubov in 1943. Danny restores the Black players’ sanity with a excellent game by Garry Kasparov holding Anatoly Karpov in their first World Championship match in Moscow 1984.
Keres Attack after 8.Rg1
Kasparov played the interesting 8…h5!? and drew an exciting tussle.
Modern theory prefers the immediate central counterattack with 8…d5! which the author recommends.
Chapter 4 – Kasparov vs Anand 1995
This is an historical chapter with games from the Kasparov – Anand match in 1995. All three games covered are high quality encounters including a fine victory by Anand in game 9. The reviewer won’t say anymore as these games are fairly well known and the book covers them well.
Chapter 5 – Engine analysis
This short chapter discusses the pros and cons of using an engine in analysis. Clearly using an engine is a vital tool but “too much dependence on chess engines, as I know from my own experience, can make you lazy and you don’t activate your own thinking processes.”
“It is vital to do your own analysis….”
Four combative tussles are subjected to engine analysis which is illuminating to say the least.
Chapter 6 – Training games vs the engine
Four games are included with the author playing White: two in the Keres attack, 1 in the Sozin and 1 in the English attack.
The last game with the engine defending against the English attack is an excellent counterattacking game.
Chapter 7 – Chef’s recommendations
This is an important chapter where the author gives his recommended lines against White’s most dangerous tries:
Keres attack
English attack
Sozin attack
Classical variation
I won’t give any more spoilers here: buy the book to find out.
Chapter 8 – Turbo calculation
The author states: “In this chapter I want to test, and hopefully turbo-charge the readers’ calculation. Calculation is so important, and all the better younger players now work on this aspect of the game.”
Six exciting positions are given and the reader is invited to calculate the consequences of a particular move. Here is example 4:
Naiditsch – Graf Bundesliga 22-23 Position after 14.Bd2
The author asks: is 14…d5 15.exd5 Nb6 good for Black or not ?Calculate and check your answer in the book.
The chapter summary gives some useful concrete tips.
Chapter 9 – Defusing the most dangerous lines
In this chapter the author plays training games with Black against the engine, sees what the engine does to defeat him, then switches colours to see how it manages to defuse these “dangerous” attempts. The Classical and Sozin lines are covered. The importance of move order is also highlighted in certain lines.
Chapter 10 – Evaluations
“So, I would strongly recommend that you spend time checking your games and get into the habit of evaluating positions. If you don’t know how to evaluate positions then what is the point of calculating, as you won’t know what to aim for anyway?”
There are 6 tough positions to evaluate.
Here is the second position:
Nepomniachtchi – Duda World Blitz St Petersburg 2018
The solution is in the book.
Chapter 11 – Scheveningen Problems
“In this chapter I am going to pose you problems relating to the course. How sharp are you tactically? Let’s find out! And don’t be concerned if you get a lot of these wrong. I probably would as well. The main thing is not that you get them right, but that it gets you thinking about the opening.”
Here is the last of 11 positions:
Scheveningen Classical after 13.Bd3
Chapter 12 – Online adventures in the Scheveningen
Danny dissects four of his on-line games, three as Black and one as White in the Scheveningen.
The chapter summary is sensible advice.
Chapter 13 6.Bg5
This is an important chapter as 6.Bg5 can lead to transpositions to the Richter-Rauzer or the Najdorf or a hybrid Sicilian.
The reader should examine these games/move orders carefully.
Here is a good example:
Ivanov Rostislav – Gabrielian Artur St Petersburg 2014
8…e5! disrupts White’s attacking build-up
Chapter 14 Keres vs Nakamura
In this chapter, Gormally discusses Nakamura’s approach when facing the Keres Attack. The main theoretical recommendation is this book is 6…h6, but Nakamura plays 6…a6 and b5. This line is very dangerous for Black but just about playable. The chapter summary shines some light: “Computers have shown that most opening lines are defendable, and even though Black is under pressure in this early a6 line against the Keres attack, the counterattacking possibilities are obviously there.”
Chapter 15 – Delving deeper
In this section, the author discusses one of the key lines in the Keres attack. But before analysing two interesting games, Danny gives some general advice.
“Not that it is particularly productive to prepare for hours on end before a chess game, at all. I firmly believe that chess players spend too much time preparing for opponents, and not enough time preparing themselves….. it is clearly responsible to do SOME preparation.”
The line is question occurs after these moves:
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e6 6.g4 h6 7.h4 Nc6 8.Rg1 d5!
There are two critical lines:
9. exd5
9.Bb5
Buy the book to learn more.
Chapter 16 – Pawn breaks/structures
Fourteen excellent examples are given.
Here is the sixth example:
Grischuk – Duda Chess.com 2018
8…?
Chapter 17 – Tips for playing the Scheveningen
This chapter gives some useful general advice on studying openings and preparation. Also included is general advice on improving at chess.
Chapter 18 – Exercises
The book finishes with an excellent set of 25 exercises: find the best move.
Here is exercise 8 (Black to play):
Gwaze – Ponomariov FIDE World Cup 2011 Position after 12.Kb1
Summary
This is an unusual book in its structure with a pot-pourri of chapters on different topics. It is not a traditional opening survey book which is the book’s strength and its weakness. The book is packed full of good advice on the main variations of the Scheveningen Sicilian concentrating on typical plans; pawn structures; manoeuvres as well as some concrete variations. The book also gives excellent advice on how to study openings generally and on how to improve at chess. The reviewer feels that a really ambitious player would need more details of concrete lines which the author acknowledges and Danny gives advice on how to build up a database of games that would cover all the major theoretical lines.
The reviewer recommends this excellent book.
FM Richard Webb, Basingstoke, Hampshire, 24th December 2024
The 1920s saw the beginnings of chess competitions for juniors. In 1921 a boys’ tournament took place in Hastings: this was repeated in 1922 and by 1923 had become the official British Boys’ Championship, for those under the age of 18. The first winner was Philip Stuart (later Sir Stuart) Milner-Barry.
That year the London Chess League decided to run their own championship for boys, starting on 31 December 1923, so you might just about claim that 2024 marks its centenary. It’s still going strong under the name of the London Junior Chess Championships.
The tournament took place, along with two sections for adult players, at St Bride’s Institute, which would remain its venue for many years. Sir Richard Barnett, whom you met last time playing chess on a liner in 1930 before sailing off into the sunset, was on hand to open the congress, advising the contestants to put ‘safety first’.
In these days of pre-teen grandmasters and an 18-year-old world champion, it’s salutary to consider how, just a century ago, the whole idea of teenagers playing chess was considered strange. The press commented on how well they played, and on how they used up most of their time on the clock.
The tournament attracted ten players, and press interest was such that we have all their initials and surnames, and, in some cases, their schools. Of course it doesn’t help that one of the competitors was J Smith, but we can at least have a stab at identifying all of them. While most of them grew up to have fairly anonymous lives (mostly) away from the chessboard, two of them had more interesting stories to tell, one inspirational, the other disturbing.
The first story I’d like to tell is that of Max Black. Born in 1909 and a pupil at Dame Alice Owen’s School in North London, he was one of the younger competitors. In spite of his relative youth he scored 6/9, finishing in third place.
Max’s father Lionel was a wealthy Jewish silk merchant, born in Kyiv, but, by 1909 living in Baku where Max (like Garry Kasparov many years later) was born. In 1912, deciding that Russia wasn’t a safe place for a Jewish family, Anglophile Lionel, his wife and two young sons (Max had now been joined by Misha) moved to England, translating their name from the Russian Tcherny to Black. Two more children would be born there: Samuel (Sam) and Rivka (Betty).
Here, in a family photo from an online tree, you can see the family at some point in the mid 1920s.
Max played in the London Boys’ Championship for the next three years (I’ll tell you how he fared another time) before graduating to adult chess in 1928. By this time he was reading mathematics at Queens’ College Cambridge, and was also moving in the same circles as the leading philosophers of the day, such as Bertrand Russell and Ludwig Wittgenstein.
He was selected to play on board 5 in that year’s Varsity match, where he faced future Communist spy Solomon Adler.
He was losing for much of the game, but, after Adler made an instructive error just before adjudication, he was fortunate to be able to share the point. (As always, click on any move in the game for a pop-up window.)
Max entered the 1928-29 Hastings Congress where he was placed in the Major B section, won by his contemporary C H O’D Alexander.
He lost this game against another talented teenager, where he made a couple of understandable defensive errors against Mortlock’s kingside attack.
In the matches preceding the 1929 Varsity Match Max won two games against Maurice Goldstein, one of the strongest London amateurs of his day.
Here’s one of them.
It’s interesting to observe in these games that players were experimenting with openings (the Pirc Defence and the Benko Gambit) which would only become established several decades later.
In the Varsity Match itself he again faced Solomon Adler, this time getting crushed with the black pieces after playing the opening much too passively.
Max’s next appearance was in the 1930 Varsity Match, by which time he’d reached the heights of Board 2, facing (Arthur) Eric Smith.
Again, he was lucky to escape with a draw after the future Canon missed a couple of wins.
But that was to be the end of his competitive chess career, as, on completing his studies he chose to devote himself to his academic and family life.
After graduating in 1930 Max spent a year studying in Göttingen, before taking a post teaching mathematics at the Royal Grammar School in Newcastle, at the same time writing his first book, The Nature of Mathematics: a Critical Survey. In 1936 he returned to London, lecturing in maths at the Institute of Education (part of University College London). In 1940, switching from maths to philosophy, he accepted a post at the University of Illinois, before becoming a philosophy professor at Cornell University in 1946. He remained at Cornell until his retirement in 1977, but continued lecturing worldwide until his death in 1988.
Describing himself as a “lapsed mathematician, addicted reasoner, and devotee of metaphor and chess”, he maintained an interest in chess throughout his life. He is particularly noted for the ‘mutilated chessboard’ problem, devised as means of demonstrating critical thinking. Take a chessboard with two opposite corners removed. Is it possible to fill the whole board with 2×1 dominoes? If you stop and think for a moment, the solution is obvious, but not everyone is able to think like that.
His celebrity chess opponents included Arthur Koestler, whom he beat in four moves, and Vladimir Nabokov, whom he beat twice, neither game lasting more than 15 minutes. It’s said that he gave displays of blindfold chess and, even in his late sixties, gave simultaneous displays against up to 20 opponents.
Source: Wikipedia
I would suggest to you that, as an analytical philosopher, searching for meaning in language, mathematics, science and art, promoting logic and critical thinking, Max Black was one of the most important figures of the 20th century you probably haven’t heard of. It’s gratifying to know that, in his teens, he took part with distinction in the first four runnings of the London Boys’ Chess Championship.
If you’re interested you can read more about him on Wikipedia and MacTutor. You’ll find lots more online as well: Google Books and Amazon Books are both helpful.
His brothers both achieved eminence as well, in very different fields. Sir Misha Black, who wasn’t a competitive chess player, was an architect and designer noted for the street signs in Westminster and for designing trains for British Rail and the London Underground. Sam Black, the youngest of the three brothers, was also an alumnus of the London Boys’ Chess Championship, and had a very distinguished international career in the field of public relations while at the same time practising as an optician. A lifelong chess player, he was Secretary of Finchley Chess Club and President of the North Circular Chess League, who still run an annual blitz tournament in his honour.
While Misha Black was campaigning for peace in the 1930s, one of Max’s opponents was following a very different path.
Clement Frederic Brüning , as the youngest player in the competition, attracted some media attention.
Daily News (London) 02 January 1924
He finished in last place, with a score of 2/9, but, undaunted, he also took part in the British Boys’ Championship a few months later, drawing with the eventual winner Wilfred Pratten in his preliminary group and finishing runner-up to Alfred Mortlock in his section of the finals.
Like Max Black, Clement came from an immigrant background. While Max was the oldest child of Russian Jewish parents who were first generation immigrants, Clement was the youngest of five sons of a German Catholic father and an English mother.
Carl Alexander Marcell Brüning (usually known as Marcell) seems to have come to England from Cloppenburg in Lower Saxony in about 1890 along with his brother Bernhard, assisting their older brother Conrad’s coal merchant’s business. The 1891 census found the family in Hampstead, and in 1901 Bernhard and Marcell were boarding in Kingston. In 1903 Marcell married Clara Mary Bagshawe, from a prominent Catholic family, whose Uncle Edward had recently retired as Bishop of Nottingham.
At this point Clara and Marcell were living a peripatetic life, living in Rochford, Essex, Newcastle, back to Rochford and then to New York, presumably for his coal dealing business. During these peregrinations, five sons were quickly born: Guy, Maurice, Roland, Peter and finally Clement in 1911.
Here, in a family photograph, is a smiling young Clement on his rocking horse.
In 1921 most of the family were still abroad, but Clara was visiting her father in Chiswick (I used to have a pupil in the next road) while Guy, taking a break from his studies, was on holiday in Westcliff on Sea, near Southend and not far from his place of birth.
They must then have returned to settle in Ealing, the Queen of Suburbs, living in a large detached house just west of the Broadway. Clement was enrolled as a pupil at Ealing Priory (now St Benedict’s) School, which was where we found him in 1924.
Clement competed in both the London and British Boys’ Championships in 1925. In the latter event he shared third place in the top section, again drawing with Pratten in a game he should have won.
John Saunders comments in BritBase:
Sources: Staffordshire Advertiser, 16 May 1925; BCM, May 1925, p216. The score of the game in BCM (from which the newspaper score may have been taken) gives the players as Bruning (White) and Pratten (Black) but the detailed description of the game on p214 makes it fairly certain that Pratten played White in the game: “In the last round Pratten very nearly had a shock. Opening with a Ponziani, which turned into a kind of Ruy Lopez after Bruning had played 3.., P-Q 3, he got a strong-looking game; but Bruning defended so well that the situation changed entirely to the holder’s disadvantage, and at last a sacrifice was obviously Black’s policy. Bruning saw this, but unfortunately sacrificed the wrong piece, and Pratten, by giving up his Queen, for adequate compensation, was able to extricate himself, and a draw resulted.” But we cannot be certain.
The computer informs me that White had an easy win in the final position, but no one seems to have realised this at the time. Insipid, as the Staffordshire Advertiser annotator calls it, it certainly wasn’t.
In 1926 he took part in the same two tournaments, but with less success, this time he performed poorly in his preliminary section of the British, but did manage to win his consolation event.
Perhaps this result was the reason why Clement decided to give up chess at this point.
In 1934, though, by which time the family, perhaps now less well off, had moved a mile to the west, to a semi-detached house in the less prestigious suburb of Hanwell, he was in the papers again, for a very different reason.
Middlesex County Times 19 May 1934
Over the next few years young Clement, clearly a young man with a gift for oratory, played an increasingly important role in Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists, speaking at events around the South of England and writing letters to newspapers. His older brothers were apparently also Blackshirts, but didn’t play a prominent role.
(Another BUF member was aviation pioneer Alliott Verdon Roe, whose mother, Annie Sophia (Verdon) Roe, had been a regular competitor in the early years of the British Ladies’ Chess Championship.)
Eastbourne Chronicle 21 November 1936
Clement is probably one of the young men in this photograph from a meeting in Eastbourne protesting against the Public Order Bill banning political uniforms: a reaction to the Battle of Cable Street.
A brief quote from the same source:
By 1937, and now the prospective parliamentary candidate for the Wood Green constituency, he had risen to the post of Propaganda Administrator for the British Union of Fascists and National Socialists, and was working closely with both Mosley and William Joyce (Lord Haw-Haw).
He was often invited to speak at Rotary Clubs, for instance here in Cheshire.
Alderley & Wilmslow Advertiser 01 October 1937
He then moved to Bethnal Green, working for what was by then the British Union, and, when war was declared in 1939, was in Germany, apparently working for Welt-Dienst (World Service), an anti-Semitic broadcasting network.
Then something unexpected happened. He ended up in a concentration camp, where he was murdered by the Nazis on 17 August 1942. What had happened? We know he was being investigated by MI5. Perhaps he’d changed his opinion and fallen foul of the Nazis, or maybe he’d been recruited as a double agent. Nobody knows, or if they do they’re not telling. A very sad and mysterious end for the cute, chubby-cheeked smiling lad on the rocking horse, for the young perpetrator of dashing but unsound attacks in his three years of participation in boys’ chess tournaments.
Two contrasting stories, then, the brilliant mathematician and philosopher whose name was Black, and his rival whose shirt was black, and whose premature endgame resulted in tragedy.
But what of the other eight pioneers of London Boys’ Chess? Their lives, as far as I can tell, took rather more conventional courses.
The tournament winner, with a 100% score, was J Allcock of Coopers’ School, now in Upminster, but then in Bow Road, East London. I believe this was Jack Adams Allcock (1906-1969), who lived very close to the school. He was clearly a promising player, but seems to have played little chess on leaving school. We can pick him up playing for London University in 1928, and in the London League for North London in 1933. His father ran an off licence in Bow, later becoming the landlord of the Duke of York in Hackney, and it seems that Jack and his wife Eliza helped him running the pub. In spite of Jack’s education the family were never well off, both Jack and Eliza leaving very little money. I can’t find any immediate connection with the strong City of London player James Frederick Allcock.
In second place, on 6½/9, was Stanley Thomas Henry Goodwin, born in 1906, and, like Max Black, a pupil at Dame Alice Owen’s School. Also from Hackney, Stanley’s father Vincent was a Post Office sorter. He married in 1932, and the 1939 Register found him living in North London and working as a brewery clerk He served in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve in World War 2, and, it seems later emigrated to Australia where he died in Perth, but I don’t have a death date. I have no further record of any chess activity after this tournament.
Percy Geoffrey Husbands (1906-1987) of Regent Street Polytechnic scored 5/9 for fourth place. Percy lived in Ealing: his father Basil was working as a furniture dealer in 1911, but by 1921 he was a house furnisher and decorator, no longer employing servants. In 1934 Husbands became a husband, marrying Lucy Sophia Eavis, whose family owned (and still own) Worthy Farm near Glastonbury. Michael Eavis, the founder of the Glastonbury Festival, is the son of Lucy’s half-brother Joseph Eavis. By 1939 Percy was living in Uckfield, Sussex, working as an Insurance Clerk. His chess career continued in the 1924 British Boys’ Championship and the minor section of the London tournament in 1924-25, but after this event he seemed to stop playing: perhaps work, as it often does, got in the way.
Being confronted by J Smith is a genealogist’s nightmare, and that’s who we have on 4/9. We do know, though, that he was John B Smith of Sir Walter St John School in Battersea, and that he also played in the following year’s tournament. The most likely candidate is John Bryan Smith, born in 1908, the son of a plumber from Wandsworth. He spent much of the 1930s travelling 1st class to and from West Africa, described first as an Assistant and then as a Merchant’s Agent before disappearing from view.
On 3½/9 we find Hugh George Excell (1907-1993) from North London Chess Club. Hugh was the son of an Insurance Claims Inspector from Hackney. He signed up for the Royal Artillery in June 1939, but in September that year was living with his fiancée in Suffolk. Hugh continued playing competitive chess occasionally until at least 1932, including this tournament the following year, and, most notably, one of the first class sections in the 1929 Ramsgate Easter Congress. In the later 1930s he took up correspondence chess, but his chess career seems to have ended with the outbreak of the Second World War.
Here he is, playing in the London Secondary Schools competition (a separate event) in 1925.
London Daily Chronicle 28 March 1925
His opponent in this game was Philip Ernest Bowers (1908-1999), who scored 3/9 in the inaugural London Boys’ Championship. Philip was the son of a Police Constable, originally from Norfolk, but who was living in Chelsea by 1921. He was a pupil at Westminster City School, and would also compete in this tournament for two more years. He returned to chess in 1935, by which time he had moved to Birmingham, and rose rapidly through the ranks to become one of his club’s leading players. By 1940 chess activity there was curtailed by the war, and it seems that, like many others, Philip stopped playing at this point. Like many chess players, he spent his adult life teaching maths.
Known as ‘Bill’ rather than Philip, here he is pictured later in life from an online family tree.
Half a point below him, and half a point above Clement Brüning in 9th place was Jack Liebster (1907-1996), the son of a Russian born GP from Stoke Newington. Both his parents were Jewish, but his mother was born in Stepney: Jack was the youngest of their five children. Chess must have been played in the family: his father is recorded as submitting correct solutions to problems in the London Daily Chronicle in 1901, but this was to be, as far as I can tell, his only experience of competitive chess. In the 1939 Register Jack was described as a Traveller, and also as an ambulance driver. He married a chemist’s daughter in 1941, and they moved to Dunstable, where they had two children and played a significant role in the local Jewish community.
That leaves one other player, variously recorded as JS Lauder or JS Lander, whose score of 3½ left him level with Hugh Excell. I can’t find anyone with that name in the right place at the right time, but I did find Joseph John Lauder (1906-1999), the son of a Scottish born Police Inspector based at Wimbledon Police Station. He was certainly a chess player, and, more importantly, a much respected chess administrator for many years. Joseph (Harry to his friends, Mr Lauder to me) was secretary of both the Surrey County Chess Association and the Southern Counties Chess Union for many years and later, in the 1970s, the SCCU Bulletin Editor. I used to visit his home in Wimbledon every year to collect our club copies of the SCCU Grading List. Quite rightly, the chess players of Surrey now compete for a trophy named in his honour. There’s no way of knowing for certain, but I do hope it was him.
There are no more pre-war chess references, but we can pick Mr Lauder up in the 1939 Register, where he was employed as a Bank Clerk and living in the next road to where he was in the 70s. The first post-war chess record I can find for him is in 1947, playing for his local club. For some years he played regular club and county chess, also enjoying competing at Bognor Regis every year up to 1962. He was a decent, above average club strength player, but it was as an administrator that he deserves to be – and still is – remembered.
There’s much more to be written about the teenage boys who played tournament chess in the 1920s. At some point I’ll introduce you to some of the other LBCC players, and perhaps some of the other competitors in the British Boys’ Championship during that period.
Sources and Acknowledgements
ancestry.co.uk (Black, Brüning and Bowers family trees)
findmypast.co.uk/British Newspaper Archives
Wikipedia
Google Books (search for Max Black and Clement Brüning)
MacTutor
British Chess News
chessgames.com
ChessBase 18/Stockfish 17
Surrey County Chess Association and Southern Counties Chess Union archives/websites
Various other sources mentioned above
I’ve long been intrigued by this match played on board a liner in 1930.
Linlithgowshire Gazette 06 June 1930
There’s much to be written about the Imperial Club, which played an important part in many aspects of London chess between its foundation in 1911 and the outbreak of the Second World War. It provided a venue for social chess for both Londoners and those from other parts of the British Empire who happened to be passing through, but it was also far more than that. The club was founded by the extraordinary Mrs Arthur Rawson (Ella Frances Bremner): I’ll tell her story, and more of the club’s story in future Minor Pieces.
The list of their players in this match provides a snapshot of their membership, and, more generally, tells us something of the social status of chess in the inter-war years.
Board 1: Sultan Khan (1903-66: Mir, along with Malik, is an erroneous honorific which shouldn’t be considered part of his name) needs no introduction. In this match he could only draw with the little-known W Veitch, although it’s quite likely the result was diplomatic.
Only seven months later he won a Famous Game against none other than Capablanca. For this and all games in this article, click on any move for a pop-up window.
Here he is, on the left, playing against his patron (board 18 in this match).
Board 2: Major Sir Richard Whieldon Barnett (1863-1930) – Irish barrister, sportsman (shooting), volunteer officer and freemason, Irish chess champion 1886-89, Conservative and Unionist MP 1916-29. Most of his constituency now comes under Holborn and St Pancras, represented today by Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer. He died just a few months later, on 30 October 1930, following an operation. You can read an extensive obituary published by the BCMhere (scroll down to ‘Barnett’).
Here’s his game from this match, which also looks like a diplomatic draw as he was a pawn up with a probably winning advantage in the final position.
Board 3: Charles Wreford-Brown (1866-1951) – amateur footballer (one of the best of his day, captaining his national team) and cricketer. He didn’t play a lot of competitive chess, but what he did was at a high standard, taking part in the unofficial chess olympiad of 1924 (he lost to Marcel Duchamp in an unlikely encounter between two very different celebrities) and playing in the 1933 British Championship, where he unfortunately had to withdraw for health reasons having won and drawn his first two games. A few years ago I met one of his cousins in a school chess club and was able to show him this game.
Here he is, wearing his England football shirt.
Board 4: Vickerman Henzell Rutherford (1860-1934), politician and doctor. The Imperial Chess Club attracted many politicians, mostly from the Conservative Party, but the splendidly named VH Rutherford was an exception, representing the Liberal Party as an MP before switching allegiance to the Labour Party. The current incarnation of his Brentford constituency, now Brentford and Isleworth, is currently represented by Ruth Cadbury, very distantly related to the Secretary of Richmond & Twickenham Chess Club.
In 1925 Barnett and Rutherford played in the two parallel sections of the First Class tournament at the British Championships in Stratford, both scoring 6/11, suggesting that they were both strong club standard players. EdoChess gives Rutherford’s rating at the time as about 2000. Judge for yourself from this game.
Board 5: Colonel E Marinas: not certain about his identity but there was a Spanish (?) naval officer named Eugenio Marinas around at the time so it might possibly have been him.
Board 6: Edward Harry Church (1867-1947), a pharmaceutical chemist from Cambridge, was a leading light in local chess circles, being President of his club for many years and would later (1938-39) be elected President of the Southern Counties Chess Union. He must have had occasion to spend time in London as well.
Board 7: JG Bennett. I’m uncertain as to the identity of this player. There were two JG Bennetts loosely involved in chess: James George Bennett (1866-1952) was a journalist from Grantham in Lincolnshire: quite a long way from London, but he could have been there on business. There was also a JG Bennett involved in administration and occasionally playing in Kent, perhaps in the Canterbury area, but I haven’t been able to identify him further.
Board 8: Miss Kate (Catherine) Belinda Finn (1864-1932) had been active in Ladies’ chess circles, being a founder member of the Ladies’ Chess Club in 1895, as well as winning the British Ladies’ Championship in 1904 and 1905. For further information see John Saunders here.
She’s on the right here, playing in the 1905 British Ladies Championship.
Board 9: this must be John Goodrich Wemyss Woods (1852-1944), a retired schoolmaster (second master and mathematics teacher at Gresham’s School, Norfolk) and amateur artist. The only other chess reference I can find for him is helping to provide some annotations to a game played by a fellow Imperial member some years earlier.
Here’s one of his paintings.
Woods, John Goodrich Wemyss; Star Bridge, Newbury, Berkshire; West Berkshire Museum; http://www.artuk.org/artworks/star-bridge-newbury-berkshire-27437
Board 10: Hon. Arthur James Beresford Lowther (1888-1967) was a barrister who served in the First World War (see here), After the war he became Assistant Commissioner for Kenya (1918-20) and later Aide-de-Camp to the Governor of Southern Rhodesia in 1923. On his return to England he took up competitive chess, finishing runner-up in the 2nd Class tournament in the 1927 British Championships.
Board 11: Miss Alice Elizabeth Hooke (1862-1942), who has featured in earlier Minor Pieces here and here. She was a chess player and organiser, sharing first place in the 1930 and 1932 British Ladies Championships.
The Imperial Review 15 July 1909 (from the Hooke family website)
Board 12: Mrs Amy Eleanor Wheelwright, née Benskin (1890-1980), another of the strongest lady players of the period, sharing first place in the 1931 British Ladies Championship, and taking the runner-up spot in 1933. Here she lost to the tournament winner, a member of Sir Umar Hayat Khan’s entourage.
Liverpool Daily Post 14 October 1931
Board 13: Rufus Henry Streatfeild Stevenson (1878-1943), later the husband of Vera Menchik and Hon. Secretary of the BCF, was one of the most important figures in British chess in the inter-war years as an administrator and also a promoter of women’s chess. He was also a regular competitive player, winning the Kent championship in 1919: a result which probably flattered him as I suspect the stronger players in the county didn’t take part.
https://www.saund.co.uk/britbase/arch30.htm
Board 14: James Frederick Chance (1856-1938) came from a prominent family of glass manufacturers in the Black Country but later devoted his life to the study of history. In 1911 he was in Offchurch, near Leamington Spa, visiting his sister Eleanor and her husband, a retired clergyman named William Bedford. They were living next door to the vicarage where James Agar-Ellis employed my great aunt Ada Padbury as a cook. He was a long-standing member of the Imperial Chess Club, serving as president from 1934 until his death. His obituary in the BCM described him as being a chess player of medium strength.
Here he is, in 1935, playing the young Elaine Saunders.
Daily Herald 25 November 1935
Board 15: Julian Veitch Jameson (1880-1932) came from a family with Irish and Scottish connections as well as links to both India and Kenya. In 1891 he was living in Bowden Hall, Great Bowden, near Market Harborough, where he might, I suppose, have met some of my father’s relations. He later worked as an indigo planter in India. His middle name came from his grandmother Mary Jane Veitch, so he may have been distantly related to Sultan Khan’s opponent. He was active in chess circles for the last few years of his life, scoring 50% in the 2nd Class B section at the 1929 British Championship in Ramsgate, when he was living in Chalfont St Giles, but later moving to Folkestone, where he drew with Yates in a 1931 simul. His son Thomas played cricket for Hampshire.
This photograph from an online family tree shows Julian with a friend.
Board 16: Miss Mary Ann Eliza Andrews (1863-1954) was born on the island of Jersey, but her family later moved to Brighton. Her brother, William Richard Andrews, was a prominent Sussex player. She later worked as a schoolmistress. In 1921 she was living in New Cross, South London, in the same road as Jack Redon and his family, but teaching at Halley Road School in Limehouse, north of the Thames. She only seems to have taken up competitive chess on her retirement, playing in the British Ladies Championship in 1923, 1926, and in 8 consecutive years from 1928 to 1935. Her best scores were 8/11 in 1934, and 7/11 in 1930, 1931 and 1932. In 1928 she shared first place in the 2nd Class B section of the West of England Championships (well ahead of Arthur Lowther), but lost this game to the other joint winner, who was killed by a Japanese sniper in Burma in 1944.
British Chess Magazine May 1923
Miss Andrews is the lady wearing what looks like a fur stole centre left, with Lilly Eveling next to her. Lilly’s sister Clara is further along the same row towards the right. If you visit BritBase here you can hover over the faces to identify the names.
Board 17: FH George. I have no information about this player. Seemingly not connected to TH George of Ilford, who would have been on a much higher board. There was a player of that age who lost all his games in a junior tournament in Ramsgate in 1929. There was a Frank Harold George from London (1870-1940) who was, intriguingly, a Comedian in 1911, and working for Harrods as a Clerk in the Counting House in 1921. This might, I suppose, have been him.
Board 18: Major General Nawab Sir Umar Hayat Khan Tiwana (1874-1944) was a soldier of the Indian Empire, one of the largest landholders in the Punjab, and an elected member of the Council of State of India, who had brought Sultan Khan to London and promoted his chess career. He must also have been a reasonably strong player himself.
Board 19: Mrs Latham is something of a mystery. She played in the 1907 Ostend Ladies tournament, then joined the Ladies club in London, moving on, like many of her clubmates, to the Imperial Chess Club, where she played at least up to this match. She can be seen in a photograph of a reception held for Alekhine in 1932, but she was never awarded even an initial, let alone a first name. Can anyone out there help identify her?
British Chess Magazine Feburary 1932
Mrs Latham is the lady seated on the left, with Mrs Arthur Rawson next to her. You’ll then spot Vera Menchik and Alekhine, with Sultan Khan on the floor on the right. Other participants on the liner included RHS Stevenson (2nd left top row), C Wreford-Brown (4th left top row), next to him Sir Ernest Graham-Little, and then Sir Umar Hayat Khan. Edward Winter provides the full list of names here (you’ll have to scroll down a bit). Note that A Rutherford is not related to VH Rutherford.
Board 20: Mrs M Healey is another mystery. She played in some tournaments in the late 1920s when she was living in South Croydon, and again in the late 1930s by which time she had moved to Hastings. She won a prize at Hastings in 1938 for the best score by a lady in the Second Class section. It’s not clear whether M was her or her husband’s initial.
Board 21: Arthur Newton Streatfeild (1859-1956) was secretary of the Carlton Club for many years. He doesn’t appear to have been a competitive chess player. A member of a distinguished family (note the spelling) who would therefore have had a family connection with his teammate on Board 13.
Board 22: most likely to be Harry Norman Hunter (1883-1966?), a music salesman/publisher originally from Sunderland. In 1921 he was working for Francis, Day & Hunter: the Hunter comes from the music hall composer and performer Harry Hunter, whose real name was William Henry Jennings, and seems to have had no connection with Harry Norman Hunter. I can’t find any other record of him playing chess.
Board 23: Miss Lilly Eveling (1867-1951) came from a prosperous family of drapers in Kent. She played competitively from 1913 up to the second world war, but with little success, scoring only 1/11 in both her appearances in the British Ladies Championship, in 1930 and 1931. Her sister Clara was also a chess player.
Board 24: Henry Bell (1858-1935) was a banker and financier, rising to become general manager of Lloyds Bank, and also a Director until his retirement in 1924. In that year he unsuccessfully stood for parliament representing the Liberal Party in a by-election for the City of London constituency. He was also the President of the Imperial Chess Club for several years.
Board 25: Sir Thomas William Richardson (1865-1947) was a former civil servant and High Court judge in India, who, on returning to England, was very much involved with promoting the development of municipal housing in Fulham.
From the National Portrait Gallery. https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/person/mp137152/sir-thomas-william-richardson
Board 26: Mrs Fitzgerald. The full name and dates of this player are currently unknown to me.
Board 27: likely to be Miss Marion Isabella McCombie (1866-1936), the daughter of a quill merchant. I have no further information about her chess.
Board 28: Mrs Yuill The full name and dates of this player are again currently unknown to me.
Board 29: Mrs Ella (Ellen on her birth record) Frances Rawson (née Bremner) (1856-1942) was the founder of the Imperial Chess Club and a promoter of chess for women and girls. Born in Glasgow, she emigrated to New Zealand where she married Arthur Rawson. Her husband died in 1894, and in about 1909 she moved to London, where she founded the Imperial Chess Club. I’ll write more about this in a future Minor Piece. Although purely a social player herself she was a very important figure in London chess in the inter-war years.
Board 30: Florence Mary (Miles-)Bailey (née Hobson) (1866-1952), daughter of a master builder and widow of a stockbroker, who achieved some fame by playing chess on long-distance aeroplane flights (see here). Although some of her games took place at a high level, her standard of play was probably at a relatively low level.
Daily Mirror 24 February 1927
Board 31: Sir Ernest Gordon Graham Graham-Little (1867-1950) was a dermatologist and Independent MP for London University from 1924 to 1950. If he’d stood for election there in 1922 or 1923 he’d have faced the novelist and chess enthusiast HG Wells, who unsuccessfully represented the Labour Party. Although not a strong player himself, Sir Ernest was a great patron of chess who rarely missed an opportunity to support his favourite game.
Board 32: Hon Mildred Dorothea Gibbs (1876-1961), known as Minnie in her family, was a daughter of the 2nd Baron Aldenham, a Conservative politician from a famous banking family.
From a family website: Quartermaster of London Voluntary Aid Detachment No. 30 of the British Red Cross Society, 1910; commandant of No. 116, 1913. Served with Bulgaria Red Cross Society in Kirk Kilisse 1912-13 (decorated by the Queen of Bulgaria). In the Great War, amongst other V.A.D. services in London, was in 1915 successively a Nurse at Westminster V.A.D. Hospital, in charge of a Belgian Refugee Convalescent Hostel, and on Air Raid duty; and, from October 1915 to November 1918, Head of the Posting Department of County of London Branch of the Bulgaria Red Cross Society. Attached to the Westminster Division of the B.R.C.S. October 1919, sometime temporary secretary and vice-chairman, chairman 1926-8. Resigned V.A.D. 1929. ‘Member’ 1918, ‘Officer’ 1919, of the Order of the British Empire. Member of the Church of England National Assembly from 1925.
She’s the girl on the right in this charming family photograph.
You’ll immediately notice a few things about the Imperial team. Most obviously, there are 13 ladies amongst the 32 players, although mostly on the lower boards. They’re all from upper middle class or even minor aristocratic backgrounds. They’re mostly older, with many born back in the 1850s and 1860s. Apart from Sultan Khan, the youngest was Amy Wheelwright, born in 1890.
And here they all are: the players from both teams: you can see a larger version, thanks to Edward Winter, here.
British Chess Magazine June 1930
I can add a little about the top three players in Lord Kylsant’s team.
Board 1: William Veitch (1877-1957) was born in Kincardineshire in the East of Scotland, which is where his surname originates. His family moved down to Hampshire, where he played for Southampton and Hampshire in the years before the First World Wat, then moving to the Lewisham area of London, where, in the 1939 Register, he was described as a Ship Owner’s Clerk. Playing on a high board for his club and a lower board for his county, he was a decent above average club standard player.
Board 2: Leslie Alec Seymour Howell (1900-1959: Alec Leslie on his birth record) was a shipping accounts clerk from the Edmonton/Tottenham area of North London, working for the Royal Mail Line. I have no other record of him playing competitive chess, but he was clearly a decent player. Here he is, pictured with his wife, Hilda.
Board 3: David(?) Storrar. Another rather unusual surname, again from the East of Scotland, so it shouldn’t be too hard to track him down. Here we hit a problem. D Storrar from Plaistow was solving chess problems in the Daily News in 1904. There was a D Storrar living in Islington in 1911, born in Perth in 1889, but he worked in banking, not in shipping. There was also a David Storrar on the electoral roll in East Ham (adjacent to Plaistow but some way from Islington) in 1913 and 1915. These three may be all the same person, or two or three different people. The 1911 Islington Storrar is apparently the same person as the David Duncan Storrar who married in Westminster in 1933, and died in Kampala in 1944, having worked for the National Bank of India. We can also pick him up in Aberfeldy, Perthshire, in the Scottish 1921 census, again described as a banker. If this is our man he must have been a ringer. Perhaps the East London 1904/1913/1915 David Storrar is a different, chess-playing, shipping person but I can’t find him on any census records or family trees. Who knows?
As a result of my problems with Mr Storrar, I decided not to go any further down Lord Kylsant’s list. None of the names looks familiar: I presume that, apart from Veitch, who had played competitively 20 years earlier, they were purely social players.
But what of Lord Kylsant himself. I’m sure you want to know more.
He was Owen Cosby Philipps (1863-1937), who had been a Liberal MP from 1906 to 1910, and then, switching allegiance, a Conservative MP between 1916 and 1922. His family also ran a shipping company, and he became involved with the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company, of which he became managing director in 1902. They gradually took control of various other shipping companies, including the Union-Castle Line, whose ship the Llangibby Castle, which had only been launched the previous year, served as the venue for this match.
Llangibby Castle in naval service during World War II
All was not well with the company, though. In 1928 investigations began looking into financial irregularities, and this match may well have been part of a charm offensive to garner favourable publicity before the trial took place. The nub of the issue seems to have been that they were accused of misleading potential investors about the company’s financial health.
When the trial took place in 1931 Kylsant, despite the efforts of his defence team led by Imperial Chess Club Vice-President Sir John Simon, was found guilty on one charge, and sentenced to a year’s imprisonment, of which he served 10 months in Wormwood Scrubs. Large companies these days get away with far worse crimes.
If you have any corrections or further information about any of the players in this match, especially about those I’ve been unable to identify, please let me know.
There’s a lot more to write about the Imperial Chess Club: there will be further posts going backwards and forwards in time and introducing you to more of their members.
But first, taking a different view of the social function of chess in the inter-war years, there’s a significant anniversary to celebrate later this month.
Join me soon for another Minor Piece.
Sources and Acknowledgements:
ancestry.co.uk
findmypast.co.uk/British Newspaper Library
Wikipedia
BritBase/John Saunders
Chess Notes/Edward Winter
British Chess Magazine
chessgames.com
ChessBase 18/Stockfish 17
Gibbs, Jameson, Howell and Hooke websites/family trees
Kingston Chess Club website
Other sources linked to above
We remember IM Adam Hunt who passed away on Tuesday, December 3rd 2024 following a nine year battle with cancer.
Adam Ceiriog Hunt was born on Tuesday, October 21st, 1980 in Oxford and his mother’s maiden name was Williams. The UK Number one single was “Woman in Love” by Barbara Streisand. Adam shared his birthday with Kim Kardashian.
Adam attended The Cherwell School and The University of Sussex to study general biology.
Jeremy Morse, Adam Hunt (12), Nick Pert (11) and Nigel Short at the Lloyds Bank Masters
Adam became an International Master in 2001 and then a FIDE Trainer in 2016. According to Felice and Megabase 2020 his attained his peak FIDE rating of 2466 in January 2008 at the age of 28.
Adam Hunt in 1998 Cathy Rogers
In 2004 Adam was living in Headington, Oxfordshire and in 2007 he moved to Ipswich in Suffolk and was married in 2019. Recently, Adam and his partner became parents to Henry.
As a junior (and together with Harriet) Adam first played for Cowley Chess Club.
Most recently Adam played for 4NCL Blackthorne Russia, prior to that Bettson.com, Midlands Monarchs and Perceptron Youth with Witney being his original team.
He was Director of Chess at Woodbridge School in Suffolk and was the brother of IM Harriet Hunt
With the white pieces is (almost exclusively) an e4 player playing the main line of Ruy Lopez (8.c3) and favouring the Fischer-Sozin against the Najdorf.
As the second player Adam played the Sicilian Najdorf and a 50:50 mixture of the King’s Indian and Grünfeld Defences.
My first Minor Piece, 3½ years ago, featured the Reverend Samuel Walter Earnshaw, the missing link between Paul Morphy and my great grandmother Jane Houghton.
I promised another article at some point demonstrating some more of his games. It’s more than time I wrote it, so here it is.
Let me take you back first of all to 9 July 1858, when Earnshaw, a young chess addict in his mid twenties in his first ministry, at St Mary’s Church Bromley St Leonards in East London, just south of the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, travelled into town to watch the young American star Paul Morphy in action against Samuel Standidge Boden. He recorded the moves, and, in 1874/5, submitted it for publication in the City of London Chess Magazine. You can read the first volume online here (it’s on page 280, with extensive annotations by Steinitz). The two Samuels became firm friends: I suggested in my previous article that Earnshaw might have been considered Boden’s Mate.
Here’s what Stockfish thinks of the game. Click on any move for a pop-up window.
Boden must have taught Earnshaw this variation, which would become his lifelong pet defence to the King’s Gambit.
The following year, he obtained a second curacy at St Thomas’s Church Birmingham, and, for some years, disappeared from the chess world.
His next job was in the small village of Nether Whitacre, 12 miles or so outside Birmingham, where he baptised several members of my great grandmother Jane Houghton’s family.
By 1865 he’d returned to chess, joining the Birmingham and Edgbaston Chess Club. Here he is, winning their club championship.
The Era 31 December 1865
He was also submitting many of his games, losses as well as wins, to the Birmingham Journal (editor unknown, appearing irregularly between 17 June 1865 and 26 December 1868, 57 articles in total, according to Tim Harding in British Chess Literature to 1914). One wonders if Earnshaw himself wrote the column, given that it published many of his games and stopped at the point when he left Birmingham.
Let’s look at a few of them.
You can judge from these games that Earnshaw enjoyed attacking chess, being particularly fond of the Evans Gambit.
He was also travelling down to London to play at the capital’s chess haunts, where he was winning games against opponents such as the German endgame expert Josef Kling.
In this game he was successful on the white side of the King’s Gambit.
At this time, matches between clubs were starting to take place. In 1866 he played for Birmingham in a match against Worcester. Although he lost both his games, his team scored a narrow victory.
Illustrated London News 14 April 1866
You’ll spot some interesting names in the Worcester squad. There’s Lord Lyttelton, Lord Lieutenant of Worcestershire and sometime President of the British Chess Association. Then we have the future Sir Walter Parratt, whom you might recall would, a few decades later, play in several Windsor – Twickenham matches.
At some point that year Earnshaw played, as you will have seen in the earlier article, a series of games against Steinitz. It’s uncertain whether these were played in London or in Birmingham. I showed you the games last time, but have now asked Stockfish for its opinion.
Another game between Earnshaw and Steinitz was published in 1879, without any indication of when (except ‘some time ago’) or where it was played. It might, I suppose, have been one of this series.
In the 1866-67 Birmingham Club Championship Earnshaw reached the semi-final, where he was paired against John Halford. After 8 games the scores were level, with three wins apiece and two draws, so lots were drawn, resulting in his opponent proceeding to the final.
Here’s one of his wins.
In April 1867 Earnshaw took part in another match, this time against a combined team from two other clubs.
The Era 21 April 1867
Lord Lyttelton was again representing the opposing team. I guess he was an honorary member of several clubs. Within a couple of decades exceedingly pleasant meetings between chess clubs would become much more frequent, strengthening the social bonds of friendship between Chess players. Long may they continue.
But then there seems to have been a break in Earnshaw’s chess career. In August 1867, as reported in my previous article, he was involved in a tragic incident, which must have affected him very much. Perhaps as a result, he left Nether Whitacre at the end of the year. His last baptism was in November, and by 22 December a new incumbent had taken over.
And look! There, on the other side, is Maria Howton (Houghton)’s illegitimate son, not, I should add, her first, fathered by a butcher in a neighbouring village, being baptised. Maria was a sister of my great grandmother Jane Houghton. Soon afterwards she’d finally marry, and Henry would take on his step-father’s surname, becoming Henry Tomes.
Earnshaw then took on a chaplaincy in Tremadog in North Wales, before being appointed headmaster of Archbishop Holgate School, Hemsworth, Yorkshire.
With a new job and five young children (born between 1861 and 1870) he must have been too busy to devote much time to chess, but by the mid 1870s he had joined both Sheffield and Leeds Chess Clubs. In 1874 he lost to Blackburne in a Sheffield simul, and in 1877 he was matched against a child prodigy in a friendly game.
Leeds Mercury 15 February 1877
Young Master Jackson didn’t exactly become a second Morphy, but his story is one perhaps for another time.
Here’s the game.
At the end of 1876, it appears that Earnshaw’s friend and fellow clergyman George Alcock MacDonnell took over the chess column of the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News. In 1877 Earnshaw returned to the ministry, becoming Rector of Ellough, a tiny village near Beccles in Suffolk, which nevertheless boasted a splendid church. His predecessor there, Richard Aldous Arnold, who had served his few parishioners for more than 60 years, came from the same family as Thomas Arnold of Rugby School and his poet son Matthew.
He now had more time for chess, travelling to London every seventh week to play at Simpson’s and Purssell’s, crossing swords, usually unsuccessfully, with the likes of Gunsberg, Blackburne, Mason and Bird, as well as winning miniatures against fellow amateurs. He would have been able to take the Great Eastern Railway from Beccles to their new Liverpool Street terminus, which had opened in 1874. He sent many of his games to Macdonnell, who was happy to publish them in his magazine column.
He was winning at one point in both these games, but ended up losing.
In the summer of 1878 Earnshaw played what would be his only public tournament, the Counties Chess Association meeting in London, but it didn’t go well for him. He only managed one draw from eight games (one may have been a loss by default) before withdrawing with four rounds still to play.
He threw away a good position again in this game.
The tournament proved controversial in more ways than one. The second class tournament included teenage prodigy Harry Jackson, whose father provoked some anger by interfering in one of his son’s games. Yes, we’ve all known parents like that. But that was a minor incident compared with the participation of the automaton Mephisto (operated by Gunsberg, although this wasn’t known at the time) in the Handicap Tournament confined to amateurs.
A few weeks later, Earnshaw tried a Fried Liver Attack against Mason when Black’s pawn was already on a6. Stockfish, unlike MacDonnell in his annotations, is happy with this, but again White lost the thread, ending up on the wrong end of a brilliancy.
Back in Suffolk, he was doing his bit to promote chess in Beccles.
Norfolk Chronicle 07 December 1878
By 1880 he was even described as a ‘chess celebrity’.
Norwich Mercury 14 January 1880
Here are a couple of wins against lower level opposition from this period.
His friend Samuel Boden’s death in January 1882 hit him hard: perhaps this is one reason why, by that time, his games were appearing less often in the press.
But in 1885 he turned up in an inter-club match. The St George’s team included Marmaduke Wyvill, runner-up in the first ever international tournament back in 1851, and formerly Rishi Sunak’s predecessor as MP for Richmond, Yorkshire.
Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News 24 January 1885
On the other side of the board, you’ll notice George Archer Hooke, who had another half century of competitive chess ahead of him, two boards above Earnshaw, with the splendidly named problemist Edward Nathan Frankenstein sitting between them.
But the next we hear from Samuel Walter Earnshaw, sadly, is from this death record, giving his name as Earnshaw-Wall (Wall was his mother’s maiden name, an affectation used by his son Walter Ethelbert Stacey Earnshaw-Wall .
The cause of death is given as Gout (21 days) and Pericarditis (3 days).
You’ll have read MacDonnell’s warm tribute to his friend in the previous article.
A true and enthusiastic lover of chess, we are told. Not a great player, but a good enough player, and really that’s all that matters. He was, for his day, well booked up, enjoying gambit play and demonstrating strong attacking skills, but all too often he would miscalculate or make careless mistakes and throw away his advantage. But he clearly enjoyed playing, whether against fellow amateurs or against the leading masters of his time. He, and many others like him, over the past 150 years or more, are what chess, in my opinion, is really all about. I’m delighted that my great grandmother and her family had made his acquaintance.
Join me again soon for more Minor Pieces.
Sources and Acknowledgements:
ancestry.co.uk
findmypast.co.uk/British Newspaper Library
Wikipedia
ChessBase 17/Stockfish 17
chessgames.com (Earnshaw here)
Yorkshire Chess History (Steve Mann: Earnshaw here)|
EdoChess (Rod Edwards: Earnshaw here) British Chess Literature to 1914 (Tim Harding: McFarland 2018) Steinitz in London (Tim Harding: McFarland 2020)
Other sources referenced and linked to above
Ralph Jackson won the Sydney Junior Championship back in 1976 and is currently ranked 7th among players in Australia born before 1960.
He is also intrigued by family history, and his interest was piqued in 2015 when a cousin showed him transcripts of letters his great grandfather’s brother had been sent by an English nephew in 1874 and 1875 concerning his family’s financial struggles, and his mother’s illness and subsequent death.
He idly, as one does, entered the name of his English relation, of whom he had previously been unaware, into Google and was both startled and delighted to discover that Antony Guest had been a prominent chess player and journalist. You could even make the case that he was the Leonard Barden of his time, and that, almost a century after his death, his influence can still be felt today.
When Ralph noticed that I’d mentioned Guest in an earlier Minor Piece he contacted me to ask what more I could discover about him. As he was on my list of future Minor Pieces, in part because of his local connections to me, I was more than happy to oblige.
The birth of Antony Alfred Geoffrey Guest (he didn’t use his rather splendid middle names for chess purposes) was registered in the second quarter of 1856 in Staines, Middlesex. His father Augustus was a schoolmaster, classicist and artist, the son of Thomas Douglas Guest. His mother Phoebe, also known as Elizabeth or Mary, was the daughter of refugees, originally from Eastern Europe, but who had arrived via Denmark. Although she was born in the Jewish faith she later converted to Christianity.
Antony was baptised by cricketing clergyman Henry Vigne in St Mary’s Church Sunbury on June 18 that year. Entirely coincidentally, I visited that church recently and took a few photographs.
I don’t know the age of the font on the left: the inscription records when it was moved, not when it was installed, but I’d guess it wasn’t the one in which baby Antony was baptised.
By 1861 the family, now joined by Isabella Katherine Celia Guest (who would later be known as Katherine or Kate), had moved to Thayer Street in central London, conveniently situated just a few yards from the Chess & Bridge Shop in Baker Street.
But on 20 June 1864 Augustus was admitted to Grove Hall Lunatic Asylum, where he died on 19 March 1866. The family were now struggling to maintain their previously affluent lifestyle, and Antony had to leave school early. By 1871 he was working as a clerk, while his mother was now a lodging-house keeper. Isabella was, for some reason, visiting a carter’s family in Hampshire.
Meanwhile, Phoebe’s three brothers, Abraham (who changed his name to Alfred Lionel), Henry and Maurice had emigrated to Australia in the 1850s, seeking their fortune in the Gold Rush.
Henry, in particular, did very well for himself. After visiting the gold fields he took a job in public service, later rising to become Registrar-General of Victoria as well as attaining the rank of Major in the volunteer forces.
It was Uncle Alfred who was the recipient of Antony’s surviving (in transcript) letters.
The first letter Ralph has is from July 1874.
Circumstances have gone very hard with us of late, my mother has been very ill lately, and has been unwell for the last two years, and find it very very difficult to make ends meet-, especially since food and other necessities have become so dear, a little assistance therefore now and then would be a very great comfort to her.
In October he wrote again with the sad news that his mother had died of gastric (typhoid) fever the previous month.
My poor mother left her affairs in a very unsettled condition, her debts amounting to nearly 70 pounds, and my sister and myself would be greatly obliged to you or our uncle Henry for any assistance you could give us.
In December he informed Uncle Alfred that he had moved into a boarding house and his employer had lent him enough money to pay off his mother’s debts, but it appears that his family in Australia had been unable to help financially.
Ralph’s final letter, from April the following year, sees Antony telling his uncle that his prospects were now good, but thanking him for his offer of a home in Australia for his ‘delicate’ sister Isabella. If she took up the offer she wasn’t there long as she was back in England by 1881.
Here, then, was a formerly prosperous family that, due to illness and death, and perhaps also financial mismanagement, had hit hard times. Young Antony was doing his best to sort things out.
He also developed an interest in chess, watching one of the games in the 1876 match between Steinitz and Blackburne, and remembering, almost a quarter of a century later, how deeply absorbed he was.
We next pick him up in 1880, when he applied to become a member of the London Stock Exchange. The 1881 census found him on holiday at the Grand Hotel in Brighton, giving his occupation as Stock Jobber. A Stock Jobber was a private trader in stocks and shares, as opposed to a Stock Broker who worked for clients. The Grand Hotel, according to Wikipedia, “was intended for members of the upper classes visiting the town and remains one of Brighton’s most expensive hotels”. He’d clearly turned round his family fortunes, then.
By this time, Antony was spending much of his spare time frequenting Purssell’s and other places where the game was played socially.
He also acquired a new job, as a journalist for the Morning Post, a Conservative daily newspaper which would be taken over by the Daily Telegraph in 1937. In 1883 a major international tournament took place in London and Antony was dispatched to report on it. His reports must have proved very popular as the paper commissioned him to start a weekly column, beginning on 28 May 1883.
The column would typically include a problem (sometimes two) for solving, a list of successful solvers of the problem from two weeks earlier, a game, either contemporary or historical, news from home and abroad, answers to readers’ questions and, on occasion, book reviews, such as this one.
Morning Post 16 July 1883
Guest was always very enthusiastic about promoting chess for ladies, so would have been pleased to support Miss Beechey‘s venture.
Although he was not yet playing in public, he started publishing a few of his own games later in the year. Here he gave his opponent odds of pawn and move (he played black without his f-pawn). As always, click on any move in the game for a pop-up window.
By 1884 he had also started to compose problems, at first in collaboration with future BCF President John Thursby.
You’ll find the solution to all problems at the end of the article.
Problem 1. #3 A Guest & J Thursby Morning Post 26-05-1884
At the same time he played in public for the first time, in a handicap tournament at Simpson’s. Here he was accepting odds of pawn and move from the masters, who, in his section, were Blackburne and Gunsberg. He won his section with 7½/9, but was beaten by Mason, also giving him odds, in the play-off between the winners of the two sections.
Buoyed by this success he took part in his first master tournament, an event run by the British Chess Association in London. His performance, considering his lack of experience, was rather remarkable.
Gunsberg, as expected, ran out a comfortable winner with 14/15, but Guest shared second place with Bird on 12/15.
In his game against Wainwright (see earlier Minor Pieces) he gave up the exchange in the opening but later trapped his opponent’s queen.
He won very quickly against Hewitt, who wasn’t given the chance to recover from a hesitation in the opening.
This was a most auspicious debut for a relatively young (by the standards of the day) player. It was probably anticipated that he would have a big future in master chess, but, as it turned out, his first high level tournament would also be his best result.
Later that year Guest was involved in an interesting debate with John Ruskin.
Morning Post 14 September 1885
The debate as to whether chess should be on the school curriculum is still going on today, almost 140 years later. Unlike many of my colleagues in the world of junior chess, I’m very much in agreement with Guest here. Ralph Jackson shares our views.
Here’s another problem, this time a joint composition with Louis Desanges.
Problem 2. #3 A Guest & L Desanges Morning Post 16-11-1885
On the same day that this problem was published there was some important news.
Morning Post 16 November 1885
A few months later the new club ran a master tournament in which Guest took part, but this time he was much less successful, only scoring 2/7, well behind Blackburne (6½), Bird and Gunsberg (both 5), and not helped by defaulting his game against Pollock.
I’m not sure whether or not this game was played in the tournament. Guest attempted to play like Steinitz, but it didn’t end well.
He had better luck later in the year in the British Chess Association Amateur Championship, which was won by Gattie (15/18), Guest sharing second place with previous Minor Piece subjects Hooke and Wainwright on 13½/18.
Guest’s next tournament was towards the end of 1887: the British Chess Association Congress in London. He had originally entered a lower section, but, on the withdrawal of Skipworth, was, at the last minute, promoted to the master section, where he would face the likes of Blackburne, Burn, Gunsberg and the ailing Zukertort.
He got off to a flying start, winning his first three games, against Bird, Pollock and the perpetual backmarker Mortimer.
His game against Pollock wasn’t short of excitement. He defended the Evans Gambit and, after various adventures, his extra pawn on the queenside eventually turned into a queen.
In Round 3 Guest sacrificed two rooks to win Mortimer’s queen. He miscalculated some later tactics, but his opponent failed to take advantage.
After a loss to Lee in the fourth round, his fifth round opponent, Mason, failed to arrive because he had confused the start time. Guest was originally awarded a win by default, but it was later decided that the game should be replayed, Mason winning.
He then lost his last four games against some of the world’s strongest players.
Against Burn he played a totally unsound Greek Gift sacrifice in this position, overlooking Black’s diagonal defence.
The game continued 9. Bxh7+? Kxh7 10. Ng5+ Kg8 and now he must have realised that 11. Qh5 fails to Bf5, while the move he tried, Qd3+, failed to g6. Regular Minor Piece readers will recall Locock making the same mistake.
Here’s the tournament crosstable.
In August 1888 the British Chess Association Amateur Championship took place in Bradford. I’m not sure how ‘amateur’ was defined (Guest was a professional chess journalist, but not a professional player), but the 1888 event was a rather weak affair compared to other years, notable for the participation of Eliza Thorold in days when ladies very rarely competed against gentlemen. There was a master tournament taking place at the same time in which some of the stronger amateurs, such as Charles Dealtry Locock, participated. Guest won with a score of 10/12, just half a point ahead of 20-year-old Bradford born mathematician George Adolphus Schott, who, however, defeated him in their individual game.
In this game, winning his opponent’s IQP proved decisive.
The Field 01 September 1888
In August 1889 Antony Guest reported some important news. A lady had won the championship of the Bristol and Clifton Chess Club.
Morning Post 19 August 1889
“There is no reason why (ladies) should not excel at the game.” Guest’s views, propounded in a Conservative-leaning newspaper, were quite enlightened for his day. It was not until 1895, though, that another – very successful – Ladies’ Chess Club was started.
In November and December 1889 the British Chess Association Masters and Amateur tournaments took place consecutively rather than simultaneously in London, so George Wainwright was able to play in both events, while Guest only took part in the latter event. In those days games in amateur tournaments were played on a fairly casual basis with games often being postponed when one of the players was unavailable.
It seems that this event ground to a halt just before Christmas once Wainwright had guaranteed victory. Several of the other players, including Guest, had been too busy to play many of their games.
It’s not known whether any further games were played after this incomplete crosstable was published.
The Field 21 December 1889
As you’ll see, Guest was the only player to beat Wainwright, in an opening variation still topical today.
He made a tactical oversight in his game against Thomas Gibbons. His opponent, a disciple of Bird, opened with 1. f4 and sacrificed a pawn on the kingside for nebulous attacking chances.
In this position, 25… Ne7 would have kept him well in control, but he erred by playing 25… Be7? 26. Rdg1! Qxh4? 27. Rxg7+ Kh8 28. Qxf5!!, after which he had to resign.
From here on, Antony Guest was playing less frequently, perhaps by choice, or perhaps because he was too busy with other activities.
The 1891 census found Guest and his fellow chess journalist Leopold Hoffer living in lodgings in Fulham Road, right by Stamford Bridge stadium, which would, in 1905, become the home of the newly founded Chelsea FC.
Just look at the name of their next door neighbour.
Yes, there he is: Raymond Keene. Not, to the best of my knowledge, related to his grandmaster and author namesake, although this Raymond’s son and grandson were also named Raymond Keene.
In an 1891 club match Guest’s temporary queen sacrifice brought victory against a strong opponent who really should have spared himself the last 20 moves.
Later that year, Guest and Hoffer were both involved in a telephone chess match against Liverpool.
Daily News (London) 14 December 1891
Liverpool won the first game, while the second game resulted in a draw.
In August 1892 Guest returned to tournament chess, taking part in the Counties Chess Association tournament in Brighton.
It didn’t go well.
Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News 13 August 1892
George MacDonnell was particularly scathing about his performance.
Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News 13 August 1892
He should make due preparation and exert himself to the utmost. He didn’t pull his punches, did he?
Guest went horribly wrong on move 10 against the eventual winner.
But he did manage to win a nice minature against Lambert.
The following month he reached this position in a game at Simpson’s against OC Müller.
Here, Guest played 27. Qg6!, an offer which can’t be accepted, and threatening Qxh7+, an offer which can’t be refused. Black should now play 27… h6, when the game is likely to be drawn by perpetual check after 28. Rh3 and a later Rxh6+. Instead he erred with 27… Bg2?, and had to resign after 28. Rg4, as h6 would be met by Rxg2.
This scathing criticism of his play in Brighton didn’t stop him playing in club matches, such as this one against Twickenham.
The Field 21 January 1893
You can read more about the Humphreys family here and about Guest’s opponent here.
He was also playing for Metropolitan, here losing a brilliancy against one of the ‘fighting reverends’. He really should have known his chess history, though. Wayte reached a winning position from the opening by transposing into a very well known predecessor.
By now Antony Guest had resumed his problem composing career, now without collaborators.
Problem 3. #3 A Guest Morning Post 1893
(Source given in MESON: however I wasn’t able to find it in a quick look to identify the date of publication.)
Problem 4. #3 A Guest Illustrated London News 25-08-1894
In 1895 he took part in the cable match between the British and Manhattan Chess Clubs, where he faced John ‘Paddy’ Ryan, capable, according to the press, of producing ‘startling brilliancies’.
Here, Ryan punted the speculative 21… Bxh3!?. What do you think? We’ll never find out what would have happened as at that point time was called and the game declared drawn.
The Ladies’ Chess Club had been founded in January 1895, and Guest used his Morning Post column to promote their activities. He was invited to give a simul at their prizegiving ceremony.
Morning Post 29 July 1895
Approaching his 40th birthday, it might have seemed like Antony Guest was a confirmed bachelor, but in 1896 he married Violet Harrington Wyman, some eleven years his junior. Violet’s brother Harrington Edward Hodson Wyman, was a knight odds player at the British Chess Club, later becoming vice-president of Ealing Chess Club. Her family firm were the publishers of Mortimer’s The Chess-Player’s Pocket Book.
In January 1897 Guest returned to tournament chess, playing in a ten-player selection tournament for that year’s Anglo-American cable match. Again he failed to complete the event, withdrawing after only three games, two losses and a win against Herbert Jacobs. Whether or not this was due solely to pressure of work is unclear.
This would be his last tournament, although he continued playing club chess. His performances, as you can see here (taken from EdoChess), show a steady downward trajectory after a promising start.
The year 1897 was significant for the publication of FR Gittins’ volume The Chess Bouquet.
As one of the Chief Chess Editors of the United Kingdom, Guest certainly qualified for inclusion.
We’re offered a photograph, a biography, a game (against Pollock, see above) and two problems. Here’s how Gittins describes him.
Physically, Mr. Guest is a perfect giant, his towering form and splendid proportions being well in evidence at the recent Hastings Festival. Socially, he is one of the best, full of bonhomie and good humour.
This is a charming mate in 2, which, unfortunately, had been anticipated by Conrad Bayer, who had published a mirror image back in 1865. It’s been reprinted on a number of occasions over the years.
Problem 5. #2 A Guest The Chess Bouquet 1897
The second problem, number 3 above, was unfortunately given with a missing pawn on c7, allowing an unwanted second solution.
He wasn’t the only Guest in The Chess Bouquet. There were also entries for Black Country problemists Thomas Guest and his son Francis Hubert Guest, who were not, as far as I can tell, related to Antony.
Here’s an exciting game played at Simpson’s against a French opponent.
Although now retired from tournament play, Guest was still making occasional appearances in consultation games, and club and county matches, both over the board and by correspondence. He was also publishing the occasional problem, such as this one, from 1900.
Problem 6. #3 A Guest Morning Post 12-03-1900
Later that year, Guest wrote a very interesting article entitled Steinitz and Other Chess-Players, first published in The Contemporary Review, and later republished in the USA in The Living Age.
The last three paragraphs, which take a broader social view of the game, are those which interest me most.
Here he is, celebrating the increasing popularity of chess among the working classes.
The present extraordinary growth of the popularity of the game must surely have some significance. Many of the players are young men engaged in offices, shops and factories; that their numbers include several clergymen, doctors, lawyers and members of other professions is not so remarkable. What strikes me as important is that so many young clerks, and others of similar occupation, should find their chief recreation, at least in the winter months, in the game of chess.
And here again on the artistic side of chess.
But I believe that in most of us there is some kind of artistic instinct, some aesthetic tendency, that finds no outlet in the humdrum of everyday life. If this is true it would sufficiently account for the increasing popularity of chess, for it is an art as well as a game. Its intricacies and combinations are capable of affording aesthetic delight that may be compared with the emotions produced by poetry, pictures or music — different, no doubt, but, to many, similarly sufficing. One need not be an expert to enjoy the pleasure of play; to the beginner it is like a voyage through an unknown country teeming with beautiful surprises. Every sitting reveals some new and captivating feature, suggests some tempting path, or affords some hint as to the best mode of pursuing the journey.
They don’t write them like that any more, do they?
You can read the whole article, along with the chapter about Guest in The Chess Bouquet, in this excellent article by Batgirl (Sarah Beth Cohen).
In 1901 it was time for another census. Strangely, Mr & Mrs Guest were not together. Antony was lodging in Bayswater, while Violet and her parents were lodging in Hastings, perhaps on holiday together.
He returned to the social aspect of chess in a 1901 article explaining how chess can build friendships between people of different nationalities.
Bromley and West Kent Telegraph 12 October 1901
For a few years now, Guest seemed, apart from his column, to stop both playing and composing, only resuming in 1907.
In this game against G Freeman from a Surrey v Essex county match he built up a strong attack from the King’s Gambit Declined.
Black had just blundered and now the rather neat 23. Rf5! forced resignation.
Problem 7. #3 A Guest Morning Post 12-08-1907
His game annotations were also being syndicated across various newspapers.
In July 1909 Antony Guest was honoured to be the subject of a feature in the British Chess Magazine, who published a photograph along with a biographical sketch contributed by Frank Preston Wildman.
Problem 8. #3 A Guest British Chess Magazine 07-1907
At some point during this decade, Antony and Violet moved out to 1 Anglesea Road, Kingston, alongside the Thames half way between Kingston and Surbiton. This was a sizeable property, with 12 rooms excluding bathrooms. (I’m not sure whether or not it was the white building you can see behind the trees, which is now Anglesea Lodge, 28 Portsmouth Road.)
This is the view from the Barge Walk on the other side of the river.
The 1911 census found them there, along with two servants, William and Marie Wilkins, a married couple of about their age, and the Wilkins’ teenage daughter Elsie.
Guest decided to join Surbiton Chess Club, playing in this match against Wimbledon.
Wimbledon News 23 December 1911
He was now becoming less active in the chess world, but in 1914 had the opportunity to express his views again on chess for schoolboys.
Cork Weekly News 25 July 1914
“In opening the way to friendships the practice of chess is very valuable to young men.”
I totally agree, although these days we might want to refer to young people instead. It worked for me, anyway.
Guest’s column continued through the war, although there was little chess action to report.
Here, he took the lack of competitive chess during the hostilities to promote the value of social chess in promoting friendship.
Cheltenham Chronicle 15 January 1916
His wife Violet sadly died in February 1921. That June the 1921 census found him still the head of the household at 1 Anglesea Road, and still working as a journalist. There was a resident housekeeper, but most of the property was taken up by motor builder John Bambury, who ran his own business in Kingston, along with his wife and five children aged between 17 and 22.
Guest was still seen regularly at major events such as Hastings and the British Championship, but by the 1924-25 Hastings Congress he was clearly in poor health and died after an operation on 29 January.
Linlithgowshire Gazette 13 February 1925
He didn’t leave that much money, compared to Hamilton Brooke Guernsey, one of whose administrators, Leslie Dewing, – one for coincidence lovers here – would have seen him at Hastings four weeks earlier, where he lost all his games in the Premier Section 1. (Coincidentally again, or perhaps not, there’s currently a marketing agency in Guernsey called Hamilton Brooke.)
The Morning Post was far from being Guest’s only chess outlet. At various times, according to Tim Harding in British Chess Literature to 1914, he also wrote columns for the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, the Daily News, Cassell’s Saturday Journal, Life and Tinsley’s Magazine.
Nor was chess the only subject on which he wrote. In 1891 Guest and barrister Sylvain Mayer co-authored Captured in Court, a novel with a legal setting. Some of the reviews were pretty harsh. “It is very unlikely to add to the reputation of either as story writers”, according to the Glasgow Herald. “… the bundle of incidents which does duty for a plot is as amateurish as the style”, proclaimed the National Observer. According to the Weekly Dispatch, “The plot is preposterous and the dialogue inane”. Preposterous plots and inane dialogues were perhaps more suitable for children’s literature, and, from 1895 onwards, he contributed to collections of short stories alongside such authors as E(dith) Nesbit, still much loved and remembered today for books such as The Railway Children.
In 1896 Antony Guest contributed an article on Some Old English Games to The Badminton Magazine of Sports and Pastimes, describing games such as Pall Mall and Shuffleboard, illustrated by Albert Ludovici., followed by More Notes on Old English Games a year later, this time including Bandy-Ball and Nine Men’s Morris.
In the early 20th century he developed (pun not intended) an interest in photography, and in 1907 his book Art and the Camera was published by G Bell and Sons, who of course also published chess books.
Morning Post 10 August 1907
This time the critics were unanimous in their praise. Modern reprints are readily available should you wish to read it.
In 1910 he turned his attention from cameras to cancer.
London Evening Standard 15 March 1910
It’s still a hot topic today, and the evidence is still inconclusive.
A man of many interests, as well as chess, then. Polymaths were probably more common then than now.
There are a couple of family issues to clear up.
Antony and Violet had no children. His sister (Isabella) Katherine married a wealthy man named Robert Edward McLeod in 1883. Robert’s brother Bentley was a chess player, representing Surrey, Brixton and Metropolitan, through the last of which he would have known Antony. Robert died in 1893, leaving his wife with two young children. Neither of them had children, so that was the end of Augustus Guest’s family. Katherine died, like her father, in a mental hospital, in Brighton in 1941.
To find Antony’s closest relations, then, we have to travel to Australia. Henry, whom you met at the start of this article, returned to England with some of his many children after his retirement. The family was hit by tragedy when his daughter Helen died in 1907. Helen and her older sister Ethel were very close, and, 18 months later, Ethel, suffering from depression as a result of the loss of her beloved sister, took her own life. There were mental health problems, then, on both sides of the Guest family.
Henry’s son Stanley later returned to Australia, married and had six children, the youngest of whom, Marisa, born in 1929, is still alive. Marisa, the closest surviving relation of Antony Guest, is the mother of Ralph Jackson.
One of the wonderful things about chess is that, even if playing competitive chess doesn’t appeal to you, there are many other ways of living your life through your favourite game. For Guest’s contemporary and acquaintance Charles Dealtry Locock it was through problems, writing and, in the last period of his life, teaching. For Antony Guest himself, it was as a journalist and occasional problemist. His record of almost 42 years might pale in comparison with Leonard Barden’s records, but it’s still very impressive. You can see a lot in common: both strong players who, finding competition a little bit too stressful, concentrated on their, in both cases, excellent newspaper columns, and perhaps did far more good in promoting chess in that way than they would have done by just playing.
He was in many ways a man ahead of his time as well. Although he wrote for a conservative newspaper, he was always very keen to promote chess for ladies, for the lower middle and working classes, and for schoolboys (it would be left to Locock to include schoolgirls). He also promoted chess for recreational and social reasons, to establish friendships on a local, national and international basis. I couldn’t agree more. Ralph Jackson is very lucky to be able to count Antony Guest as a close relation.
Problem Solutions:
Problem 1:
Problem 2:
Problem 3:
Problem 4:
Problem 5.
Problem 6.
Problem 7.
Problem 8.
Acknowledgements and sources.
Ralph Jackson – private correspondence
Batgirl (Sarah Beth Cohen) articles on Guest and Donisthorpe at chess.com
Krone Family website here
ancestry.co.uk
findmypast.co.uk/British Newspaper Library
ChessBase/MegaBase2023/Stockfish16.1
chessgames.com (Antony Guest here)
EdoChess (Antony Guest here) British Chess Literature to 1914 (Tim Harding) The Chess Bouquet (FR Gittins) British Chess Magazine July 1909 (thanks to John Upham)
Wikipedia
Yet Another Chess Problem Database
MESON Chess Problem Database
Other sources referred and linked in the text.
Save as PDF
We focus on the British Chess Scene Past & Present !
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish. Cookie settingsACCEPT
Privacy & Cookies Policy
Privacy Overview
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are as essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Save as PDF
