English Chess Forum

A game played by Peter's father: [Event "Worcestershire vs Shropshire and Herefordshire"] [Site "Birmingham Midland Institute"] [Date "1948.11.06"] [Round "?"] [White "Southall, G. T."] [Black "Swinnerton-Dyer, Leonard (Sir)"] [Result "0-1"] [ECO "D31"] [Opening "QGD: semi-Slav, Noteboom variation"]...

To complete this topic This seems to be the right age for our man and gives another address for him: Islington Gazette - Monday 11 December 1893.png This next is definitely him and a further address. Islington Gazette - Wednesday 18 September 1895.png Unless there are two James Masons living in Glen...

From Thomas Holmes' entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography which covers the period when he would have known James Mason: 'In 1877 Holmes had a serious accident which eventually made it impossible for him to continue his work as an iron-moulder. His friends, who appreciated his gift for...

I think the reference to 'dancing on the pavement' and the Islington Gazette report showing that James Mason was arrested for doing the same is the evidence we need that Holmes is talking about James Mason in his reminiscence. Their friendship - and Holmes' support for Mason - deserves to be better ...

These two items from the Islington Gazette sadly fit the description.

LONDON'S UNDERWORLD by Thomas Holmes published in 1912 contains the following reminiscence. It seems to describe a real chess player or problemist. Does anyone have any idea who it was? 'Some of my friends have crossed the river, but as I think of them they come back and bid me tell their stories. H...

Alex McFarlane wrote: ↑

Wed Mar 27, 2019 11:02 am

It is Alan who should get the credit.

To quote Shaggy, 'It wasn't me!'

Harding's claim that the game was played by Labourdonnais is still on-line (http://www.chessmail.com/research/Historic-games.html). The page above is not linked to either from Tim's home page, or even his research page under which it is found in the link above. It would be difficult for anyone to c...

The Essex County Association Lightning Championship will be taking place in June 2019. Does anybody know of any other lightning tournaments? Lightnig chess is where a buzzer used to go and a move had to be made every 10 seconds, It was also sometimes played every 5 seconds, or perhaps just for the ...

From the Birmingham Daily Post - Wednesday 15 September 1971

We all make mistakes - that's why they put rubbers on the ends of pencils.

The arrival in London of De la Bourdonnais is announced in the Morning Post of Saturday 28 June 1834 and Bell's Life in London of Sunday 29 June 1834. I doubt they would have waited three weeks if he'd already started to play games in town.

The answer to my Quiz Question is unsurprisingly, Dominic Lawson. You can read the whole thing here https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/dominic-lawson/dominic-lawson-this-poverty-debate-is-fuelled-by-anger-at-the-rich-not-sympathy-for-the-poor-5331394.html but you'll need a strong stom...

I've now listened to Lawson's reply and he spends little or no time on the the real causes of poverty, but spends his most of his answer criticising the poor for gambling, smoking and drinking. We've had to listen to this nonsense ever since the nineteenth century. Some people might like chess to b...

Maybe just tell us the opinion you have in mind? I thought that Justin might agree that reducing the maximum stake on fixed odds betting terminals to £2 was desirable. As for the contributors to Twitter above, if there had been no problem previously, then the change wouldn't have been necessary. It...