English Chess Forum

Thanks for the information, John. I was clearly wrong in assuming that there was a notable difference in standard between Kuiken and Stebbings. Earlier this season Anthony was graded 219, but he was quite a bit lower than that in 1973.

Thanks for this, Roger. Perhaps the Kuikens were related. L C Kuiken was listed as coming from Lensbury, Middlesex, in the 1973 grading list, but I am going to assume that J C Kuiken is correct.

Thanks for putting more 1970s games on to BritBase, John. Would you happen to know if the J C Kuiken, who played in the Ilford Open of 1973 was the Leo C Kuiken, who later became an Eastbourne and Hastings player? One or two of his games are given in the collection of Bernard Cafferty's games. If he...

Thanks for this auction listing, Richard, which provides proof that he was born in 1896. I had some difficulty finding out when he died as there seemed to be no local knowledge of his passing. I recently wrote about how Arthur Hall seemed to have been largely forgotten about by the chess community a...

Thanks for this, John. Anyone who is particularly interested in king pawn endings might like to look at the Rhodes v Drewitt game from Southport. It is uncertain that White can win the ending and in any case it is doubtful that Black should have resigned.

I do not know if anyone has carried out any research into the difficult biographical information regarding Herbert Gibson Rhodes. I note that three family trees on the Ancestry website state that he died in 1982, but a few years ago I obtained a death certificate for him, which gave his date of deat...

I enclose a couple of games from the Major Open event: [Event "BCF Congress, Southport, Major Open"] [Site "?"] [Date "1924.08.15"] [Round "5"] [White "Moses, GW."] [Black "Drewitt, JAJ."] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "D40"] [PlyCount "57"] 1. d4 d5 2. Nf3 c5 3. e3 e6 4. c4 Nf6 5. Nc3 Nc6 6. a3 Bd6 7. Bd3 O-...

I wrote a chess obituary for Professor Cornforth last year. It was published in the Sussex Chess News for 2014, which can still be accessed on line.

In the following game Harry Golombek is playing for Bletchley CC. I do not know if he had any connection with Bletchley Park: [Event "Bletchley CC v Oxford Univ. board 2"] [Site "?"] [Date "1944.12.02"] [Round "?"] [White "Golombek, H."] [Black "Cornforth, JW."] [Result "0-1"] [ECO "A60"] [Annotator...

Thanks for this, Gerard. The game between Richmond and Dr Dunstan was also published in the West Susssex Times and Standard of 8.10.1904, but without any information about the competition in which it was played. It may be of interest that according to my notes the date on which the players met at Ha...

Many thanks for this, John - it will probably save me quite a bit of time. Your work rate is amazing!

Many thanks to Roger for providing me with a link for the 2013 BCF Congress at Torquay. I am sorry if I have caused any inconvenience by diverging from the previous history section. I notice that John has mentioned the 1909 Scarborough Congress and indeed BritBase has a good proportion of the Britis...

Many thanks for this, Roger. You seem to be very good with IT. There appears to be a problem with downloading games from the 2013 BCF Congress at Torquay. The British Championship games can be accessed through BritBase, but the other tournaments, which used to be on the ECF website, seem to have dis...

I have found one more game in a BCF Yearbook: [Event "BCF Congress, Tunbridge W. 1st Class B"] [Site "?"] [Date "1908.08.??"] [Round "?"] [White "Miller, D."] [Black "MacBean, WP."] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "D31"] [PlyCount "55"] [EventDate "1908.??.??"] 1. d4 d5 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 c6 4. e3 Bd6 5. Nf3 Nd7 6...

According to the 1908 BCF Yearbook, H Ford was Harry Ford. There was an H Ford, who was a member of the Metropolitan Chess Club in the 1920s and 1930s. Could this be the same person?