Tag Archives: Deaths

Death Anniversary of IMC Ken Messere OBE (16-iv-1928 31-iii-2005)

BCN remembers Ken Messere who passed away on Thursday, March 31st 2005 aged 76 in Paris-16E-Arrondissement, Paris, France.

Kenneth Charles Messere was born on Monday, April 16th, 1928 in Richmond-on-Thames, Surrey. His father was Charles (George) Messere (1901-1974) or Eisenberg and aged 26. His mother was Gertrude Marie Newman (1899-1978) and aged 29.

Ken had three siblings: Barbara Marie Messere (1930–2005), Hugh Martin Messere (1932–1985) and Derek R Messere (1934–2012)

Ken attended St. Peter’s College, Oxford from 1946 – 1951 to read philosophy and is reported in the 1951 St. Edmund Hall Magazine, as a member of the Trillick (debating) Society as follows:

‘ That this House would rather be a live Communist than
a dead Democrat.’ The proposer established to his own satisfaction that democracy was founded on ‘selfishness, capitalism and bourgeois hypocrisy.’ He did not satisfy J. F. R. Bonguard of St. Peter’s Hall who opposed, using arguments taken from Hindu philosophy. K. C. Messere of St. Peter’s Hall, spoke third and added some able arguments.

In June 1954 Ken married Mary Elizabeth Humphrey (1929-2003) in Ealing. They had a son Miles Jonathan Messere born in 1964 who passed away in 1965.

Prior the time of his passing his wife Mary was living at 142B, Herbert Road, Woolwich, London, SE18 3PU.

In 1991 he was awarded the OBE (Civil Division) in the Queen’s Birthday honours list. The citation reads: Kenneth Charles Messere, lately Head of Fiscal Affairs Division, OECD, Paris.

Ken appears each year from 1953 to 1967 in the noted publication Britain, Royal And Imperial Calendars the function of which is to list entries for those engaged in UK public service. He worked for HM Customs and Excise. Prompted by this we consulted the venerable A History of Chess in the English Civil Service by Kevin Thurlow (Conrad Press, 2021) on page 447 and found

“He played for Customs. In 1964, he went to work for the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development and was head of fiscal affairs from 1971 – 1991. In 1954 he began playing postal chess and became a leading player. He won a semi-final of the 5th World Correspondence Championship (1961 – 64) and became the first English player to compete in a World Championship Final.”

There are 31 games listed at his personal entry at chessgames.com starting with games from 1965.

Chessbase’s Correspondence Database 2020 records 69 games the earliest being from 1958 listing Ken’s federation as being France.

From British Chess (Pergamon Press, 1983) we have this lengthy contribution from Ken himself:

“Between the ages of 6, when I learnt to play and 23 (ed: 1951), when I ceased to be a student, chess had a relatively low priority among various time-competing interests and activities, so I never got around to studying theory. Things changed when I became a civil servant and needed a replacement for philosophy as an intellectually absorbing subject which could be argued about with friends over beers, and for the next 12 years chess became my main interest.

Since 1964 I have been working for the OECD in Paris, where my friends are not chess enthusiasts and, although chess remains a major pleasure, my commitment to it has lessened. Nowadays, out-side correspondence chess, I play only occasional blitz games.

Coming late to serious chess has probably had at least some influence on my deficiencies and stylistic preferences. The deficiencies include an inability to visualize ahead with sufficient clarity to support accurate analysis, slow sight of the board which leads to silly errors through time trouble or failing stamina and less familiarity with theory than my better opponents. As to chess style, I have had to play romantically and subjectively to get good results.

If a game takes the form of a clear-cut position, where strategical objectives are clear and superior technique prevails, then mine generally does not. Consequently I have tended to play either sharp gambits or counter-gambits or to try to render the position sufficiently obscure for imagination and intuition to assume maximum importance. In keeping, my chess heroes have been Alekhine, Bronstein and Tal who revel in fantasy, however much Alekhine may claim that it is logically based.

When I took up competitive chess seriously in 1952, I made some progress and won a few minor tournaments, but in view of the defects already mentioned, it soon became clear that my potential for improvement was limited and that nearly all my games were aesthetically flawed. Fortunately, these defects represent no great handicap at correspondence chess, where I found myself pleased with a reasonable proportion of the game I played, and in addition, capable on the day (or more accurately over the years) of winning against almost anyone. Thus, against world champions I have two wins and one loss, (see below). I also have 80 per cent from five games against Russian grandmasters, even if a meagre 28 per cent from my eighteen games against all correspondence grandmasters. In 1954 when I began playing postal chess competitively, I did sufficiently well in a few British Postal tournaments to be accepted at a reasonably high level in the official international tournaments.

Not without luck (see Diagram l), I secured the 75 per cent necessary in two seven-player tournaments to qualify for the fourteen player preliminaries, the winner of which was to qualify for the following world championship. In the 1961-64 preliminaries, I played the best chess of my life, including valid opening innovations, imaginative pawn and piece sacrifices and even a technically efficient win in a queen and pawn end-game. I won the tournament with eleven wins, one draw and one loss, 1.5 points ahead of Maly of Czechoslovakia and two points ahead of Masseev, the Russian favourite, thereby obtaining my first norm towards the International Master title. My first annotated game is the win against Maly (ed: to be inserted once we have tracked down the game score!) which was typical stylistically and also crucial, since if he had won it, he would have qualified for the World Championship instead of me: the second against Bartha of the United States is the most compulsive and difficult tactical game I have ever played, the last five moves alone requiring over 100 hours of analysis.

IMC Ken Messere OBE (16-iv-1928 31-iii-2005)
IMC Ken Messere OBE (16-iv-1928 31-iii-2005)

The quality of my chess in the 1965-68 World Championship was much inferior. The tournament began disastrously. I went in for three losing variations as Black and made a suicidal clerical error in the opening so that after 3 months I had four losses from four games. Later, there were compensations. I won against V. Zagarovsky, the reigning world champion (the third annotated game) and obtained just (but only just) the necessary 33.3% per cent to obtain the correspondence chess international master title. For this I needed a win and draw from my last two games which
after 3.5 years, had to be adjudicated.

Fortunately, the win and draw were relatively clear, though this would not have been so a few moves earlier. An an illustration of how the threat of adjudication breeds irrationality, Diagram II gives the closing stages of my win against J.Estrin of the USSR – a more recent correspondence chess world champion. My only other game against a world champion was against the winner of this tournament, Hans Berliner of the United States, with whom I collaborated on a book of the tournament. The collaboration was stimulating but not without friction, since I had to write 75 per cent of the book to see it ever finished. It took a year to complete, 3 years to appear (published by BCM) but in the end was well-reviewed, sold over 2000 copies and royalties are still (gently) drifting in.

The Fifth Correspondence Chess World Championship, Hans Berliner & Ken Messere, British Chess Magazine, BCM Quarterly Nunber 14, 5th December 1971, ISBN 978-0-900846-05-2.
The Fifth Correspondence Chess World Championship, Hans Berliner & Ken Messere, British Chess Magazine, BCM Quarterly Nunber 14, 5th December 1971, ISBN 978-0-900846-05-2.

 

In the early seventies, in order to reduce numbers of games, I retreated altogether from individual tournaments, just playing twice for England in the Olympiads. Whether team play did not suit my style, or whether my technique had improved but imagination withered, I drew nine of my seventeen games from the two tournaments, winning four and losing four. As England looked likely to aspire to medals for the first time ever, my 50 per cent would not help matters and I gladly retreated to first reserve, which to my dismay required taking over five unfinished games of Hugh Alexander, who died during the tournament, and who, for me, has always been England’s most attractive player and writer. My most uncomfortable decision in correspondence chess was a rejection of Hugh’s intended continuation in one of these games, {Diagram III). Of these five games, I lost one and drew four and England won a bronze medal.

In 1974 was invited to compete in the Potter Memorial Tournament of four postal grandmasters and nine international masters. After so many years of responsible’ team chess for England, I went beserk and sacrificed a pawn in ten of the twelve games, trying later to salvage inferior end-games. Result 33 % per cent. B. H. Wood invited me to write a book of the tournament, to which a number of the players contributed and this was published in 1979.

The Potter Memorial, Ken Messere, CHESS (Sutton Coldfield), 1975
The Potter Memorial, Ken Messere, CHESS (Sutton Coldfield), 1975

Also in 1979 I began to play in another invitation tournament of thirteen players organised by the Australian Correspondence Chess League, which became a memorial to CJS Purdy, its president and the first world postal champion, who died soon after the tournament began. At the time of writing, this tournament, comprising four grandmasters (including one former world champion and two runners-up) and eight international masters, is still in its early stages.”

From British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXV (125, 2005), Number 5 (May), page 226 we have this obituary:

“Kenneth Charles Messere (16 iv 1928, Richmond – 31 iii 2005, Paris) was one of Britain’s strongest correspondence players (he held the correspondence IM title) and well-known author of books on the subject. After graduating from Oxford University, Ken Messere went to HM Customs and Excise, and thence to the Organisation for Economic Development (OECD) where he became head of the fiscal affairs division and a world expert on fiscal law. He reached the final of 1965-8 world correspondence championship, beating world champions Zagorovsky and Estrin, and wrote the book of the tournament with Hans Berliner (published by BCM)”

From The Potter Memorial by Ken Messere, CHESS (Sutton Coldfield), “Chess for Modern Times” Series, 1975 we have this potted biography:

“Compiler of this book, took 3rd place in 1957 and 2nd in 1968 in the championship of the Postal Chess Club. Scores of 4.5 out of 6 in the ICCF Masters 1957-8 and 4/6 in the 1959-61 Championship took him to victory with 11/5 out of 13 in the 1961-3 semi-finals, securing him his first international master norm and qualifying him for the 5th World Championship 1964-7 in which he scored 5.5, just enough for the IM title, with wins over Zagorovsky, then world champion and Estrin, world champion now. Ken Messere collaborated with Berliner, who won it, in a book on the tournament.

He then switched to play exclusively as a member of the British Olympiad team, taking over 2nd board when Alexander died.

The switch back from rather cautious team play to enterprising individual games in 1974-7 provides some of the subject matter of this book.”

 

The Tax System in Industrialized Countries, Ken Messere, Oxford University Press, 1998, ISBN 10: 1982933135 / ISBN 13: 9781982933135
The Tax System in Industrialized Countries, Ken Messere, Oxford University Press, 1998, ISBN 10: 1982933135 / ISBN 13: 9781982933135

Death Anniversary of IMC Ken Messere OBE (16-iv-1928 31-iii-2005)

BCN remembers Ken Messere who passed away on Thursday, March 31st 2005 aged 76 in Paris-16E-Arrondissement, Paris, France.

Kenneth Charles Messere was born on Monday, April 16th, 1928 in Richmond-on-Thames, Surrey. His father was Charles (George) Messere (1901-1974) or Eisenberg and aged 26. His mother was Gertrude Marie Newman (1899-1978) and aged 29.

Ken had three siblings: Barbara Marie Messere (1930–2005), Hugh Martin Messere (1932–1985) and Derek R Messere (1934–2012)

Ken attended St. Peter’s College, Oxford from 1946 – 1951 to read philosophy and is reported in the 1951 St. Edmund Hall Magazine, as a member of the Trillick (debating) Society as follows:

‘ That this House would rather be a live Communist than
a dead Democrat.’ The proposer established to his own satisfaction that democracy was founded on ‘selfishness, capitalism and bourgeois hypocrisy.’ He did not satisfy J. F. R. Bonguard of St. Peter’s Hall who opposed, using arguments taken from Hindu philosophy. K. C. Messere of St. Peter’s Hall, spoke third and added some able arguments.

In June 1954 Ken married Mary Elizabeth Humphrey (1929-2003) in Ealing. They had a son Miles Jonathan Messere born in 1964 who passed away in 1965.

Prior the time of his passing his wife Mary was living at 142B, Herbert Road, Woolwich, London, SE18 3PU.

In 1991 he was awarded the OBE (Civil Division) in the Queen’s Birthday honours list. The citation reads: Kenneth Charles Messere, lately Head of Fiscal Affairs Division, OECD, Paris.

Ken appears each year from 1953 to 1967 in the noted publication Britain, Royal And Imperial Calendars the function of which is to list entries for those engaged in UK public service. He worked for HM Customs and Excise. Prompted by this we consulted the venerable A History of Chess in the English Civil Service by Kevin Thurlow (Conrad Press, 2021) on page 447 and found

“He played for Customs. In 1964, he went to work for the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development and was head of fiscal affairs from 1971 – 1991. In 1954 he began playing postal chess and became a leading player. He won a semi-final of the 5th World Correspondence Championship (1961 – 64) and became the first English player to compete in a World Championship Final.”

There are 31 games listed at his personal entry at chessgames.com starting with games from 1965.

Chessbase’s Correspondence Database 2020 records 69 games the earliest being from 1958 listing Ken’s federation as being France.

From British Chess (Pergamon Press, 1983) we have this lengthy contribution from Ken himself:

“Between the ages of 6, when I learnt to play and 23 (ed: 1951), when I ceased to be a student, chess had a relatively low priority among various time-competing interests and activities, so I never got around to studying theory. Things changed when I became a civil servant and needed a replacement for philosophy as an intellectually absorbing subject which could be argued about with friends over beers, and for the next 12 years chess became my main interest.

Since 1964 I have been working for the OECD in Paris, where my friends are not chess enthusiasts and, although chess remains a major pleasure, my commitment to it has lessened. Nowadays, out-side correspondence chess, I play only occasional blitz games.

Coming late to serious chess has probably had at least some influence on my deficiencies and stylistic preferences. The deficiencies include an inability to visualize ahead with sufficient clarity to support accurate analysis, slow sight of the board which leads to silly errors through time trouble or failing stamina and less familiarity with theory than my better opponents. As to chess style, I have had to play romantically and subjectively to get good results.

If a game takes the form of a clear-cut position, where strategical objectives are clear and superior technique prevails, then mine generally does not. Consequently I have tended to play either sharp gambits or counter-gambits or to try to render the position sufficiently obscure for imagination and intuition to assume maximum importance. In keeping, my chess heroes have been Alekhine, Bronstein and Tal who revel in fantasy, however much Alekhine may claim that it is logically based.

When I took up competitive chess seriously in 1952, I made some progress and won a few minor tournaments, but in view of the defects already mentioned, it soon became clear that my potential for improvement was limited and that nearly all my games were aesthetically flawed. Fortunately, these defects represent no great handicap at correspondence chess, where I found myself pleased with a reasonable proportion of the game I played, and in addition, capable on the day (or more accurately over the years) of winning against almost anyone. Thus, against world champions I have two wins and one loss, (see below). I also have 80 per cent from five games against Russian grandmasters, even if a meagre 28 per cent from my eighteen games against all correspondence grandmasters. In 1954 when I began playing postal chess competitively, I did sufficiently well in a few British Postal tournaments to be accepted at a reasonably high level in the official international tournaments.

Not without luck (see Diagram l), I secured the 75 per cent necessary in two seven-player tournaments to qualify for the fourteen player preliminaries, the winner of which was to qualify for the following world championship. In the 1961-64 preliminaries, I played the best chess of my life, including valid opening innovations, imaginative pawn and piece sacrifices and even a technically efficient win in a queen and pawn end-game. I won the tournament with eleven wins, one draw and one loss, 1.5 points ahead of Maly of Czechoslovakia and two points ahead of Masseev, the Russian favourite, thereby obtaining my first norm towards the International Master title. My first annotated game is the win against Maly (ed: to be inserted once we have tracked down the game score!) which was typical stylistically and also crucial, since if he had won it, he would have qualified for the World Championship instead of me: the second against Bartha of the United States is the most compulsive and difficult tactical game I have ever played, the last five moves alone requiring over 100 hours of analysis.

IMC Ken Messere OBE (16-iv-1928 31-iii-2005)
IMC Ken Messere OBE (16-iv-1928 31-iii-2005)

The quality of my chess in the 1965-68 World Championship was much inferior. The tournament began disastrously. I went in for three losing variations as Black and made a suicidal clerical error in the opening so that after 3 months I had four losses from four games. Later, there were compensations. I won against V. Zagarovsky, the reigning world champion (the third annotated game) and obtained just (but only just) the necessary 33.3% per cent to obtain the correspondence chess international master title. For this I needed a win and draw from my last two games which
after 3.5 years, had to be adjudicated.

Fortunately, the win and draw were relatively clear, though this would not have been so a few moves earlier. An an illustration of how the threat of adjudication breeds irrationality, Diagram II gives the closing stages of my win against J.Estrin of the USSR – a more recent correspondence chess world champion. My only other game against a world champion was against the winner of this tournament, Hans Berliner of the United States, with whom I collaborated on a book of the tournament. The collaboration was stimulating but not without friction, since I had to write 75 per cent of the book to see it ever finished. It took a year to complete, 3 years to appear (published by BCM) but in the end was well-reviewed, sold over 2000 copies and royalties are still (gently) drifting in.

The Fifth Correspondence Chess World Championship, Hans Berliner & Ken Messere, British Chess Magazine, BCM Quarterly Nunber 14, 5th December 1971, ISBN 978-0-900846-05-2.
The Fifth Correspondence Chess World Championship, Hans Berliner & Ken Messere, British Chess Magazine, BCM Quarterly Nunber 14, 5th December 1971, ISBN 978-0-900846-05-2.

 

In the early seventies, in order to reduce numbers of games, I retreated altogether from individual tournaments, just playing twice for England in the Olympiads. Whether team play did not suit my style, or whether my technique had improved but imagination withered, I drew nine of my seventeen games from the two tournaments, winning four and losing four. As England looked likely to aspire to medals for the first time ever, my 50 per cent would not help matters and I gladly retreated to first reserve, which to my dismay required taking over five unfinished games of Hugh Alexander, who died during the tournament, and who, for me, has always been England’s most attractive player and writer. My most uncomfortable decision in correspondence chess was a rejection of Hugh’s intended continuation in one of these games, {Diagram III). Of these five games, I lost one and drew four and England won a bronze medal.

In 1974 was invited to compete in the Potter Memorial Tournament of four postal grandmasters and nine international masters. After so many years of responsible’ team chess for England, I went beserk and sacrificed a pawn in ten of the twelve games, trying later to salvage inferior end-games. Result 33 % per cent. B. H. Wood invited me to write a book of the tournament, to which a number of the players contributed and this was published in 1979.

The Potter Memorial, Ken Messere, CHESS (Sutton Coldfield), 1975
The Potter Memorial, Ken Messere, CHESS (Sutton Coldfield), 1975

Also in 1979 I began to play in another invitation tournament of thirteen players organised by the Australian Correspondence Chess League, which became a memorial to CJS Purdy, its president and the first world postal champion, who died soon after the tournament began. At the time of writing, this tournament, comprising four grandmasters (including one former world champion and two runners-up) and eight international masters, is still in its early stages.”

From British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXV (125, 2005), Number 5 (May), page 226 we have this obituary:

“Kenneth Charles Messere (16 iv 1928, Richmond – 31 iii 2005, Paris) was one of Britain’s strongest correspondence players (he held the correspondence IM title) and well-known author of books on the subject. After graduating from Oxford University, Ken Messere went to HM Customs and Excise, and thence to the Organisation for Economic Development (OECD) where he became head of the fiscal affairs division and a world expert on fiscal law. He reached the final of 1965-8 world correspondence championship, beating world champions Zagorovsky and Estrin, and wrote the book of the tournament with Hans Berliner (published by BCM)”

From The Potter Memorial by Ken Messere, CHESS (Sutton Coldfield), “Chess for Modern Times” Series, 1975 we have this potted biography:

“Compiler of this book, took 3rd place in 1957 and 2nd in 1968 in the championship of the Postal Chess Club. Scores of 4.5 out of 6 in the ICCF Masters 1957-8 and 4/6 in the 1959-61 Championship took him to victory with 11/5 out of 13 in the 1961-3 semi-finals, securing him his first international master norm and qualifying him for the 5th World Championship 1964-7 in which he scored 5.5, just enough for the IM title, with wins over Zagorovsky, then world champion and Estrin, world champion now. Ken Messere collaborated with Berliner, who won it, in a book on the tournament.

He then switched to play exclusively as a member of the British Olympiad team, taking over 2nd board when Alexander died.

The switch back from rather cautious team play to enterprising individual games in 1974-7 provides some of the subject matter of this book.”

 

The Tax System in Industrialized Countries, Ken Messere, Oxford University Press, 1998, ISBN 10: 1982933135 / ISBN 13: 9781982933135
The Tax System in Industrialized Countries, Ken Messere, Oxford University Press, 1998, ISBN 10: 1982933135 / ISBN 13: 9781982933135

Death Anniversary of IMC Ken Messere OBE (16-iv-1928 31-iii-2005)

BCN remembers Ken Messere who passed away on Thursday, March 31st 2005 aged 76 in Paris-16E-Arrondissement, Paris, France.

Kenneth Charles Messere was born on Monday, April 16th, 1928 in Richmond-on-Thames, Surrey. His father was Charles (George) Messere (1901-1974) or Eisenberg and aged 26. His mother was Gertrude Marie Newman (1899-1978) and aged 29.

Ken had three siblings: Barbara Marie Messere (1930–2005), Hugh Martin Messere (1932–1985) and Derek R Messere (1934–2012)

Ken attended St. Peter’s College, Oxford from 1946 – 1951 to read philosophy and is reported in the 1951 St. Edmund Hall Magazine, as a member of the Trillick (debating) Society as follows:

‘ That this House would rather be a live Communist than
a dead Democrat.’ The proposer established to his own satisfaction that democracy was founded on ‘selfishness, capitalism and bourgeois hypocrisy.’ He did not satisfy J. F. R. Bonguard of St. Peter’s Hall who opposed, using arguments taken from Hindu philosophy. K. C. Messere of St. Peter’s Hall, spoke third and added some able arguments.

In June 1954 Ken married Mary Elizabeth Humphrey (1929-2003) in Ealing. They had a son Miles Jonathan Messere born in 1964 who passed away in 1965.

Prior the time of his passing his wife Mary was living at 142B, Herbert Road, Woolwich, London, SE18 3PU.

In 1991 he was awarded the OBE (Civil Division) in the Queen’s Birthday honours list. The citation reads: Kenneth Charles Messere, lately Head of Fiscal Affairs Division, OECD, Paris.

Ken appears each year from 1953 to 1967 in the noted publication Britain, Royal And Imperial Calendars the function of which is to list entries for those engaged in UK public service. He worked for HM Customs and Excise. Prompted by this we consulted the venerable A History of Chess in the English Civil Service by Kevin Thurlow (Conrad Press, 2021) on page 447 and found

“He played for Customs. In 1964, he went to work for the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development and was head of fiscal affairs from 1971 – 1991. In 1954 he began playing postal chess and became a leading player. He won a semi-final of the 5th World Correspondence Championship (1961 – 64) and became the first English player to compete in a World Championship Final.”

There are 31 games listed at his personal entry at chessgames.com starting with games from 1965.

Chessbase’s Correspondence Database 2020 records 69 games the earliest being from 1958 listing Ken’s federation as being France.

From British Chess (Pergamon Press, 1983) we have this lengthy contribution from Ken himself:

“Between the ages of 6, when I learnt to play and 23 (ed: 1951), when I ceased to be a student, chess had a relatively low priority among various time-competing interests and activities, so I never got around to studying theory. Things changed when I became a civil servant and needed a replacement for philosophy as an intellectually absorbing subject which could be argued about with friends over beers, and for the next 12 years chess became my main interest.

Since 1964 I have been working for the OECD in Paris, where my friends are not chess enthusiasts and, although chess remains a major pleasure, my commitment to it has lessened. Nowadays, out-side correspondence chess, I play only occasional blitz games.

Coming late to serious chess has probably had at least some influence on my deficiencies and stylistic preferences. The deficiencies include an inability to visualize ahead with sufficient clarity to support accurate analysis, slow sight of the board which leads to silly errors through time trouble or failing stamina and less familiarity with theory than my better opponents. As to chess style, I have had to play romantically and subjectively to get good results.

If a game takes the form of a clear-cut position, where strategical objectives are clear and superior technique prevails, then mine generally does not. Consequently I have tended to play either sharp gambits or counter-gambits or to try to render the position sufficiently obscure for imagination and intuition to assume maximum importance. In keeping, my chess heroes have been Alekhine, Bronstein and Tal who revel in fantasy, however much Alekhine may claim that it is logically based.

When I took up competitive chess seriously in 1952, I made some progress and won a few minor tournaments, but in view of the defects already mentioned, it soon became clear that my potential for improvement was limited and that nearly all my games were aesthetically flawed. Fortunately, these defects represent no great handicap at correspondence chess, where I found myself pleased with a reasonable proportion of the game I played, and in addition, capable on the day (or more accurately over the years) of winning against almost anyone. Thus, against world champions I have two wins and one loss, (see below). I also have 80 per cent from five games against Russian grandmasters, even if a meagre 28 per cent from my eighteen games against all correspondence grandmasters. In 1954 when I began playing postal chess competitively, I did sufficiently well in a few British Postal tournaments to be accepted at a reasonably high level in the official international tournaments.

Not without luck (see Diagram l), I secured the 75 per cent necessary in two seven-player tournaments to qualify for the fourteen player preliminaries, the winner of which was to qualify for the following world championship. In the 1961-64 preliminaries, I played the best chess of my life, including valid opening innovations, imaginative pawn and piece sacrifices and even a technically efficient win in a queen and pawn end-game. I won the tournament with eleven wins, one draw and one loss, 1.5 points ahead of Maly of Czechoslovakia and two points ahead of Masseev, the Russian favourite, thereby obtaining my first norm towards the International Master title. My first annotated game is the win against Maly (ed: to be inserted once we have tracked down the game score!) which was typical stylistically and also crucial, since if he had won it, he would have qualified for the World Championship instead of me: the second against Bartha of the United States is the most compulsive and difficult tactical game I have ever played, the last five moves alone requiring over 100 hours of analysis.

IMC Ken Messere OBE (16-iv-1928 31-iii-2005)
IMC Ken Messere OBE (16-iv-1928 31-iii-2005)

The quality of my chess in the 1965-68 World Championship was much inferior. The tournament began disastrously. I went in for three losing variations as Black and made a suicidal clerical error in the opening so that after 3 months I had four losses from four games. Later, there were compensations. I won against V. Zagarovsky, the reigning world champion (the third annotated game) and obtained just (but only just) the necessary 33.3% per cent to obtain the correspondence chess international master title. For this I needed a win and draw from my last two games which
after 3.5 years, had to be adjudicated.

Fortunately, the win and draw were relatively clear, though this would not have been so a few moves earlier. An an illustration of how the threat of adjudication breeds irrationality, Diagram II gives the closing stages of my win against J.Estrin of the USSR – a more recent correspondence chess world champion. My only other game against a world champion was against the winner of this tournament, Hans Berliner of the United States, with whom I collaborated on a book of the tournament. The collaboration was stimulating but not without friction, since I had to write 75 per cent of the book to see it ever finished. It took a year to complete, 3 years to appear (published by BCM) but in the end was well-reviewed, sold over 2000 copies and royalties are still (gently) drifting in.

The Fifth Correspondence Chess World Championship, Hans Berliner & Ken Messere, British Chess Magazine, BCM Quarterly Nunber 14, 5th December 1971, ISBN 978-0-900846-05-2.
The Fifth Correspondence Chess World Championship, Hans Berliner & Ken Messere, British Chess Magazine, BCM Quarterly Nunber 14, 5th December 1971, ISBN 978-0-900846-05-2.

 

In the early seventies, in order to reduce numbers of games, I retreated altogether from individual tournaments, just playing twice for England in the Olympiads. Whether team play did not suit my style, or whether my technique had improved but imagination withered, I drew nine of my seventeen games from the two tournaments, winning four and losing four. As England looked likely to aspire to medals for the first time ever, my 50 per cent would not help matters and I gladly retreated to first reserve, which to my dismay required taking over five unfinished games of Hugh Alexander, who died during the tournament, and who, for me, has always been England’s most attractive player and writer. My most uncomfortable decision in correspondence chess was a rejection of Hugh’s intended continuation in one of these games, {Diagram III). Of these five games, I lost one and drew four and England won a bronze medal.

In 1974 was invited to compete in the Potter Memorial Tournament of four postal grandmasters and nine international masters. After so many years of responsible’ team chess for England, I went beserk and sacrificed a pawn in ten of the twelve games, trying later to salvage inferior end-games. Result 33 % per cent. B. H. Wood invited me to write a book of the tournament, to which a number of the players contributed and this was published in 1979.

The Potter Memorial, Ken Messere, CHESS (Sutton Coldfield), 1975
The Potter Memorial, Ken Messere, CHESS (Sutton Coldfield), 1975

Also in 1979 I began to play in another invitation tournament of thirteen players organised by the Australian Correspondence Chess League, which became a memorial to CJS Purdy, its president and the first world postal champion, who died soon after the tournament began. At the time of writing, this tournament, comprising four grandmasters (including one former world champion and two runners-up) and eight international masters, is still in its early stages.”

From British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXV (125, 2005), Number 5 (May), page 226 we have this obituary:

“Kenneth Charles Messere (16 iv 1928, Richmond – 31 iii 2005, Paris) was one of Britain’s strongest correspondence players (he held the correspondence IM title) and well-known author of books on the subject. After graduating from Oxford University, Ken Messere went to HM Customs and Excise, and thence to the Organisation for Economic Development (OECD) where he became head of the fiscal affairs division and a world expert on fiscal law. He reached the final of 1965-8 world correspondence championship, beating world champions Zagorovsky and Estrin, and wrote the book of the tournament with Hans Berliner (published by BCM)”

From The Potter Memorial by Ken Messere, CHESS (Sutton Coldfield), “Chess for Modern Times” Series, 1975 we have this potted biography:

“Compiler of this book, took 3rd place in 1957 and 2nd in 1968 in the championship of the Postal Chess Club. Scores of 4.5 out of 6 in the ICCF Masters 1957-8 and 4/6 in the 1959-61 Championship took him to victory with 11/5 out of 13 in the 1961-3 semi-finals, securing him his first international master norm and qualifying him for the 5th World Championship 1964-7 in which he scored 5.5, just enough for the IM title, with wins over Zagorovsky, then world champion and Estrin, world champion now. Ken Messere collaborated with Berliner, who won it, in a book on the tournament.

He then switched to play exclusively as a member of the British Olympiad team, taking over 2nd board when Alexander died.

The switch back from rather cautious team play to enterprising individual games in 1974-7 provides some of the subject matter of this book.”

 

The Tax System in Industrialized Countries, Ken Messere, Oxford University Press, 1998, ISBN 10: 1982933135 / ISBN 13: 9781982933135
The Tax System in Industrialized Countries, Ken Messere, Oxford University Press, 1998, ISBN 10: 1982933135 / ISBN 13: 9781982933135

Death Anniversary of Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

BCN remembers much loved Ken Whyld who passed away on July 11th 2003 in Lincolnshire.

Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association
Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association

From Chess : The Records :

“Ken Whyld was the editor of Chess Students Quarterly in the early 1950s and from 1955-63, Chess Reader, in which he reviewed more than 500 chess books. He has written seven tournament books and one match book.

Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

With J. Gilchrist he wrote a three-volume anthology of Lasker’s games, and with David Hooper, The Oxford Companion to Chess.

Ken at the gravestone of "William" Steinitz
Ken at the gravestone of “William” Steinitz

For the book World Chess Champions he wrote the chapters on Lasker and Smyslov. In his playing days he was champion of his county (Nottinghamshire) many times and played in the British Championship as well as international tournaments.”

Ken Whyld  (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

Possibly the best tribute to Ken was written by John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty in the August 2003 issue of British Chess Magazine, pages 398 – 402.

Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld
Ken Whyld

Here is his Wikipedia entry

See more details from the Ken Whyld Association

The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Oxford Companion to Chess
The Oxford Companion to Chess
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Reader
Chess Reader
Chess Stalker Quarterly
Chess Stalker Quarterly
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.

Death Anniversary of Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

BCN remembers much loved Ken Whyld who passed away on July 11th 2003 in Lincolnshire.

Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association
Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association

From Chess : The Records :

“Ken Whyld was the editor of Chess Students Quarterly in the early 1950s and from 1955-63, Chess Reader, in which he reviewed more than 500 chess books. He has written seven tournament books and one match book.

Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

With J. Gilchrist he wrote a three-volume anthology of Lasker’s games, and with David Hooper, The Oxford Companion to Chess.

Ken at the gravestone of "William" Steinitz
Ken at the gravestone of “William” Steinitz

For the book World Chess Champions he wrote the chapters on Lasker and Smyslov. In his playing days he was champion of his county (Nottinghamshire) many times and played in the British Championship as well as international tournaments.”

Ken Whyld  (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

Possibly the best tribute to Ken was written by John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty in the August 2003 issue of British Chess Magazine, pages 398 – 402.

Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld
Ken Whyld

Here is his Wikipedia entry

See more details from the Ken Whyld Association

The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Oxford Companion to Chess
The Oxford Companion to Chess
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Reader
Chess Reader
Chess Stalker Quarterly
Chess Stalker Quarterly
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.

Death Anniversary of Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

BCN remembers much loved Ken Whyld who passed away on July 11th 2003 in Lincolnshire.

Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association
Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association

From Chess : The Records :

“Ken Whyld was the editor of Chess Students Quarterly in the early 1950s and from 1955-63, Chess Reader, in which he reviewed more than 500 chess books. He has written seven tournament books and one match book.

Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

With J. Gilchrist he wrote a three-volume anthology of Lasker’s games, and with David Hooper, The Oxford Companion to Chess.

Ken at the gravestone of "William" Steinitz
Ken at the gravestone of “William” Steinitz

For the book World Chess Champions he wrote the chapters on Lasker and Smyslov. In his playing days he was champion of his county (Nottinghamshire) many times and played in the British Championship as well as international tournaments.”

Ken Whyld  (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

Possibly the best tribute to Ken was written by John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty in the August 2003 issue of British Chess Magazine, pages 398 – 402.

Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld
Ken Whyld

Here is his Wikipedia entry

See more details from the Ken Whyld Association

The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Oxford Companion to Chess
The Oxford Companion to Chess
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Reader
Chess Reader
Chess Stalker Quarterly
Chess Stalker Quarterly
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.

Death Anniversary of Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

BCN remembers much loved Ken Whyld who passed away on July 11th 2003 in Lincolnshire.

Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association
Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association

From Chess : The Records :

“Ken Whyld was the editor of Chess Students Quarterly in the early 1950s and from 1955-63, Chess Reader, in which he reviewed more than 500 chess books. He has written seven tournament books and one match book.

Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

With J. Gilchrist he wrote a three-volume anthology of Lasker’s games, and with David Hooper, The Oxford Companion to Chess.

Ken at the gravestone of "William" Steinitz
Ken at the gravestone of “William” Steinitz

For the book World Chess Champions he wrote the chapters on Lasker and Smyslov. In his playing days he was champion of his county (Nottinghamshire) many times and played in the British Championship as well as international tournaments.”

Ken Whyld  (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

Possibly the best tribute to Ken was written by John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty in the August 2003 issue of British Chess Magazine, pages 398 – 402.

Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld
Ken Whyld

Here is his Wikipedia entry

See more details from the Ken Whyld Association

The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Oxford Companion to Chess
The Oxford Companion to Chess
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Reader
Chess Reader
Chess Stalker Quarterly
Chess Stalker Quarterly
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.

Death Anniversary of Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

BCN remembers much loved Ken Whyld who passed away on July 11th 2003 in Lincolnshire.

Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association
Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association

From Chess : The Records :

“Ken Whyld was the editor of Chess Students Quarterly in the early 1950s and from 1955-63, Chess Reader, in which he reviewed more than 500 chess books. He has written seven tournament books and one match book.

Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

With J. Gilchrist he wrote a three-volume anthology of Lasker’s games, and with David Hooper, The Oxford Companion to Chess.

Ken at the gravestone of "William" Steinitz
Ken at the gravestone of “William” Steinitz

For the book World Chess Champions he wrote the chapters on Lasker and Smyslov. In his playing days he was champion of his county (Nottinghamshire) many times and played in the British Championship as well as international tournaments.”

Ken Whyld  (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

Possibly the best tribute to Ken was written by John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty in the August 2003 issue of British Chess Magazine, pages 398 – 402.

Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld
Ken Whyld

Here is his Wikipedia entry

See more details from the Ken Whyld Association

The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Oxford Companion to Chess
The Oxford Companion to Chess
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Reader
Chess Reader
Chess Stalker Quarterly
Chess Stalker Quarterly
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.

Ken Whyld Remembered (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

BCN remembers much loved Ken Whyld who passed away on July 11th 2003 in Lincolnshire.

Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association
Ken Whyld from CHESS magazine, January 1950. courtesy of the Ken Whyld Association

From Chess : The Records :

“Ken Whyld was the editor of Chess Students Quarterly in the early 1950s and from 1955-63, Chess Reader, in which he reviewed more than 500 chess books. He has written seven tournament books and one match book.

Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

With J. Gilchrist he wrote a three-volume anthology of Lasker’s games, and with David Hooper, The Oxford Companion to Chess.

Ken at the gravestone of "William" Steinitz
Ken at the gravestone of “William” Steinitz

For the book World Chess Champions he wrote the chapters on Lasker and Smyslov. In his playing days he was champion of his county (Nottinghamshire) many times and played in the British Championship as well as international tournaments.”

Ken Whyld  (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)
Ken Whyld (06-iii-1926 11-vii-2003)

Possibly the best tribute to Ken was written by John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty in the August 2003 issue of British Chess Magazine, pages 398 – 402.

Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Editorial from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 395 by Editor, John Saunders
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 398 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 399 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 400 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 401 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld Remembered from British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXIII (123), Number 8 (August), page 402 by Editor, John Saunders and Bernard Cafferty
Ken Whyld
Ken Whyld

Here is his Wikipedia entry

See more details from the Ken Whyld Association

The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Collected Games of Emanuel Lasker
The Oxford Companion to Chess
The Oxford Companion to Chess
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Chess : The Records, Guinness, 1986, SBN 10: 0851124550ISBN 13: 9780851124551
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Learn Chess in a Weekend
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Columns : A List
Chess Reader
Chess Reader
Chess Stalker Quarterly
Chess Stalker Quarterly
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
The Oxford Companion to Chess, 1st Edition
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.
Curse of Kirsan by Sarah Hurst, Ken wrote the Foreword.

Death Anniversary for CGM Adrian Hollis (02-viii-1940 26-ii-2013)

BCN remembers CGM Adrian Hollis who passed away in Wells, Somerset on Tuesday, February 26th 2013  at the age of seventy-two.

Adrian Swayne Hollis was born in Bristol, Avon on Friday, August 2nd 1940. During this critical period the Luftwaffe was wisely extending its Battle of Britain targets to include Britain’s airfields. Furthermore, Bristol was bombed heavily between June 1940 and May 1944. The longest period of regular bombing, known as the ‘Bristol Blitz’ began in autumn 1940 and ended the following spring. The first bombs of the Bristol Blitz fell at around 6 pm on Sunday 24 November 1940.

Adrian was the only child of MI5 director general Roger Henry Hollis KB CBE (later to become Sir Roger Hollis) and Evelyn Esme Hollis (née Swayne) who was Roger’s first wife. Roger was from Wells and Evelyn from Burnham-on-Sea and they were married on July 17th 1937 in Wells Cathedral with Evelyn’s father performing the ceremony.

Adrian won a scholarship in classics to Eton College and then went up to Keble College, Oxford where he took a first in mods and greats. Whilst at Keble Adrian represented Oxford in four varsity matches between 1959 and 1962. Indeed, his support for varsity matches was maintained for many years attending a large number into and beyond the Lloyds Bank era. Stalwart organiser Henry Mutkin would always be sure to extend an invitation.

In 1961 Adrian become the youngest ever West of England Champion at the age of 21.

Adrian met Margaret Mair Cameron Edwards in 1967 at St. Andrew’s University where he taught Classics and she taught German. They married and had two daughters, Jennifer (b. 1974) and Veronica (b. 1977) and a son.

He was the Games Editor for the British Correspondence Chess Association (BCCA) resigning in 1969.

In 1984 Adrian was forced to endure allegations against his father by Chapman Pincher (in CPs book Too Secret too Long) that Sir Roger had been a Soviet spy / mole. These allegations were demonstrated to be false. He may well also have been aware of allegations against his friend and chess mentor Graham Mitchell earlier in 1963. Ironically, it was Adrian’s father who initiated the investigation into Graham. Again, the rumours were shown to be unfounded.

Adrian became a director of the company Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies Limited on the September 1st 1996 and resigned on May 12th 2007. He was also a Vice President of the West of England Chess Union (WECU).

Between 2003 and 2007 (according to the Electoral Roll) Adrian lived at 63, Bainton Road, Oxford, OX2 7AG :

63, Bainton Road, Oxford, OX2 7AG
63, Bainton Road, Oxford, OX2 7AG

and following his retirement (and the time of the 2008 electoral roll) Adrian had moved to Pound House, Southover, Wells, BA5 1UH :

Pound House, Southover, Wells, BA5 1UH
Pound House, Southover, Wells, BA5 1UH

Adrian has written many learned papers and has had two books published :

Fragments of Roman Poetry C.60 BC-Ad 20, AS Hollis, Oxford University Press, 2007
Fragments of Roman Poetry C.60 BC-Ad 20, AS Hollis, Oxford University Press, 2007

and

Ovid Metamorphoses VIII (Schools Edition): Bk. 8, AS Hollis. Oxford University Press, 2008
Ovid Metamorphoses VIII (Schools Edition): Bk. 8, AS Hollis. Oxford University Press, 2008

During his time at Keble College, Adrian engaged with and mentored many chess players including Jonathan Rowson (1996), David Norwood (1988), Julian Way, David Goodman (1977) and Dharshan Kumaran (1993).

CGM Adrian Hollis
CGM Adrian Hollis

Julian was a personal student of Adrian’s and was kind enough to tell us :

I do remember Adrian well. He could quote Latin verse ad infinitum. He was an expert on Ovid.
In terms of chess he had a huge pile of Informators in his study still in their cardboard packaging. He was very kind to me and insisted I play above him for Keble in the intercollegiate matches.

I gave him a copy of Developments in the Orthodox QGD which I had written in 1987. He was quite taken back when I didn’t want any money for it. He seemed to have quite a lot of respect for me.

I once asked him why he had given me a place at Oxford. He replied that he couldn’t have rejected someone with my passion and enthusiasm.
I kept in touch with Adrian until his passing. He gave me a lovely reference when I resumed my studies in 2007 at Kingston University.
I remember him as a kind and unassuming man. He became a lifelong friend.

CGM Adrian Hollis
CGM Adrian Hollis

From British Chess (Pergamon Press, 1983) Botterill, Levy, Rice and Richardson :

“I was born on August 2nd, 1940, educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford and now teach Classics at Keble College, Oxford. I learned the moves at the advanced age of thirteen from a cousin who himself could have made a good chess player had he not been seduced by Philosophy and brain-teasers; all that remains in the mind from these encounters is a vision of perpetually losing my rooks to fianchettoed bishops.

Adrian Hollis. Source : The Potter Memorial
Adrian Hollis. Source : The Potter Memorial

My first ever tournament was the London Boys’ Championship 1956-7. In the opening round fate allotted me Black against David Rumens. As it happened, the brochure included a game of his from the previous year in which he had answered 1.d4 with 1…Nc6, quite enough, in my opinion, to condemn his utterly.

(Ed: The above position did not impress Adrian hugely.)

This view seemed confirmed when within twelve moves of an advance French I was two pawns up. Then, however, aided by my over confidence he worked up a fierce attack, and I just escaped with a draw. Nevertheless, I won the tournament; an opponent remarked how quickly I played my moves.

Thereafter the game was never so easy, but I did reasonably, well, winning the championships of the British Universities, West of England and East of Scotland, and playing for England quite regularly during the 1960s (including 7.5/12 in six Anglo-Dutch matches).

Leonard Barden, Henry Mutkin, Adrian Hollis and Bob Wade observe Nick Ivell vs Ken Regan at the 1983 Varsity match
Leonard Barden, Henry Mutkin, Adrian Hollis and Bob Wade observe Nick Ivell vs Ken Regan at the 1983 Varsity match

The high spot of my over-the-board chess was the series of World Student team championships from 1960 to 1964 in glamorous places (Leningrad, Helsinki, Mariánské Lázně, Budva and Cracow); most enjoyable of these being Budva, 1963 where one could bathe every day in the Adriatic and I won the (?) gold medal on Board 1 with 7.5/9., the year after Spassky (this must look good in the records, unless they happen to reveal that for the first time in preliminary and final sections, and that England did not qualify for the top final).

My best chess was probably played at Mariánské Lázně, 1962, where in successive rounds I had favourable draws with Radulov and Hort, coming close to beating the latter. Ironically, I was awarded the British Master title after I had virtually retired from over-the-board chess.

In 1964 I decided that henceforth for me ‘serious’ chess would mean correspondence, while OTB became a pleasant social activity. My introduction to the postal game had been made about 1955 by a colleague of my father’s, International Master Graham Mitchell, to whom I owe an enormous debt for the patience and kindness with which he played a series of games, bearing with me when I lost interest in worsening positions. The switch to postal play was caused by a number of factors, negative and positive : an impending move to Scotland, where there was less OTB chess, frustration at constantly spoiling good positions through mistakes in time pressure – on the other hand a feeling that correspondence chess should suit an academic temperament, and a particularly fascinating game played in 1963-4 with Michael Haygarth (see below) on which I spent so much time and energy that I almost feared it would ruin my post-graduate exams.

In 1964-5 I qualified for the British Championship by winning a candidates’ section with 100%, and then competed three times in the British Championship itself (1965-6, 1966-7, 1970-71), winning on each occasion (the first time jointly with S. Milan) and remaining unbeaten. International play also proved successful, and I soon collected the two norms necessary for the IM title (Ed: awarded in 1970).

Linda Brownson (Newnham & Basildon), left, playing Maria Eagle (Pembroke & Formby) being observed by John Nunn, Adrian Hollis and Harry Golombek posing for the obligatory "staring at the board" picture for the 1981 Varsity Match sponsored by Lloyds Bank.
Linda Brownson (Newnham & Basildon), left, playing Maria Eagle (Pembroke & Formby) being observed by John Nunn, Adrian Hollis and Harry Golombek posing for the obligatory “staring at the board” picture for the 1981 Varsity Match sponsored by Lloyds Bank.

The first chance for the Grandmaster title came on Board 1 in the Seventh Olympiad final. Despite a rare loss with the White pieces(my only defeat with white for a stretch of 15 years), things went well, including a lucky win against the reigning World Champion, Horst Rittner, and the enticing prospect beckoned if only I could beat the Russian Moiseyev. He held a slight advantage since the opening, but I thought I saw the chance of tempting him to an incorrect sacrifice. Back came his move; he had indeed made the sacrifice and the envelope burnt a hole in my pocket during an important meeting (my mind was elsewhere). After a mere two days’ thought I sent my reply. The post between England and the USSR takes about a month for the return trip. Soon after posting my move, as I was walking from the Ashmolean Museum to Keble, just passing the front gate of St. John’s, the realisation of what I had overlooked hit me, and there followed an inexorable wait for the death blow which I now saw only too clearly.

So no Grandmaster title, but Great Britain still took the bronze medals, and I scored 6/9 (+5=1-2).

Bob Wade, Harry Golombek and Adrian Hollis observe Penny Coxon (Newnam) and Anita Rakshit (St. Hilda's) during the 1983 Varsity match sponsored by Lloyds Bank
Bob Wade, Harry Golombek and Adrian Hollis observe Penny Coxon (Newnam) and Anita Rakshit (St. Hilda’s) during the 1983 Varsity match sponsored by Lloyds Bank

Another opportunity came when the British Postal Chess Federation organised a tournament (1974-6) in memory of its former secretary RJ Potter.  This started inauspiciously for me with a heavy defeat at the hands of Grandmaster Endzelins of Australia., a country which has so far provided my least favourite opposition (not only is the postage extremely expensive, but my score to date is 0/2).

From The Potter Memorial, Ken Messere, Chess (Sutton Coldfield), 1979 we have this potted biography from Ken Messere :

The Potter Memorial, Ken Messere, Chess (Sutton Coldfield), 1979
The Potter Memorial, Ken Messere, Chess (Sutton Coldfield), 1979

“Adrian Hollis is 36, was educated at Eton and Oxford, has written two books on the poet Ovid and is a Fellow and Tutor in Classics at Keble College, Oxford. He is a British Master at over the board chess and has been Champion of British Universities, West of England and East Scotland.

In 1964, he went to teach at St. Andrews University where his wife, Margaret, taught German. They were married and moved to Keble College in 1967 and now have two daughters. Jennifer is nearly five and Veronica is two.

Adrian began to concentrate on correspondence chess in 1964 and won the British Correspondence Chess Championship jointly in 1966 and outright in 1967 and 1971. He won the I.M. title in 1970 and his fine score of 6/9 on top board for Great Britain in the I.C.C.F. VIIth Correspondence Chess Olympiad Final contributed to the team’s winning the bronze medal in this event.”

and now back to Adrian’s British Chess article…

Thereafter my fortunes improved; one opponent accepted too trustingly some faulty analysis by Szabo in Informator (for a while it seemed that the Hungarian might earn me not one but two points). The East German Dr. Baumbach failed to find an improvement in a line with which I had been successful in the Seventh Olympiad Final.

Also, I had a win with the Black pieces against the Russian Kopylov. The result was a score of 9/12 (+8=2-2), which sufficed for the grandmaster title and first place half a point ahead of the Finn Kauranen.

Since then I have played quite well on second board behind Keith Richardson in the Eighth Olympiad Final (+5=7-0), and very badly indeed (scoring just about 50% in the Heilimo Memorial Tournament organised from Finland (I was much impressed by the strength of the Finnish players, most of whom I had not encountered before). Having twice narrowly failed, I would still like to qualify for the Final of the Individual World Championship. Of course life becomes increasingly busy, but the examples of Hugh Alexander and Graham Mitchell encourage me to believe that one can continue to play well at postal chess longer than over-the-board. So perhaps around the year 2000, when the children are grown up….”

Adrian Hollis and Harry Golombek observer Andrew Dyson (Trinity) having played 1.d4 versus IM William Watson (Merton) during the 1984 Varsity match sponsored by Lloyds Bank
Adrian Hollis and Harry Golombek observer Andrew Dyson (Trinity) having played 1.d4 versus IM William Watson (Merton) during the 1984 Varsity match sponsored by Lloyds Bank

From British Chess Magazine, Volume CXXXIII (133, 2013), Number 4 (April), pp.194-5 we have this obituary written by James Pratt :

Adrian Swayne Hollis (2 viii 1940 Bristol – 26 ii 2013 Wells), British Master and Correspondence Grandmaster (1976), three times British Correspondence Champion, has died. He played most of his OTB chess as a young man, finishing seventh equal at the British Aberystwyth, 1961, when he beat, amongst others, A.R.B. Thomas and former champion, Alan Phillips. He gave future champion, Jonathan Penrose, a tough fight in the last round before conceding the half-point. He played in the Hastings Premier, 1962/3 and emerged with a plus score in the Anglo-Dutch matches. He was an occasional reviewer for BCM.

It was, of course, in the realm of postal player that he shone most brightly!

In 1966 we see him playing board two for England, below Slade Milan, and, two years later, Adrian scored 9/12 in a World Postal Qualifier, narrowly missing a place in the final. In 1971 he won the British Correspondence Championship, easily outdistancing a tough field. He played top board for England in the 1972-7 Olympiad. In 1974-6 he won the Reg Potter Memorial. In the ninth Olympiad – 1982-5 – Adrian Hollis was undefeated on board two. And England took the Gold Medal!

Obituary from Raymond Keene in The Specatator

Obituary from Kenneth Shelton in The Independent

Obituary from ? in The Times

Obituary from John Rhodes in The Chess Improver

Obituary from Bob Jones of Keverel Chess.

Wikipedia article.