English Chess Forum

Richard James has this, relating to the 1930 Munich Olympiad.



A striking incident, you might think (reported, as the excerpt says, in the Evening Standard, with the clipping being from the Falkirk Herald of 30 July 1930). But do we have any information on what actually happened? I note that the game score seems not to appear in the chessgames.com record of either Weenink or Kmoch, though the game between them from London three years earlier is easily located.

There is no reference to the incident in the Olimpbase review (the source for which is not clear - is it original?) though the players met in the opening round, of which match the other three games are available. I also find no mention of any incident in my sole printed source for the event, Chess Olympiads by Árpád Földeák, Corvina, 1966.

Did any such incident occur? And where has the game score gone?

MegaBase simply gives Weenink-Kmoch 1-0 with no moves given.

There was a BCM Classic reprint (No 14 in the series) entitled Die Scacholympiade von Hamburg Erinnergungen an die Landerkampfe der FIDE 1930. This was a reprint of the original tournament book published in 1931 and contains 150 games. Half a dozen authors are named, one of whom is J Dimer who is presumably the man referred to in the news clipping. I don't have a copy of this book in either edition but it may be that another member of the Forum has it and can provide further enlightenment.

The game's in Megabase 2022.

[Event "Olympiad-03"] [Site "Hamburg"] [Date "1930.07.13"] [Round "1"] [White "Weenink, Henri Gerard"] [Black "Kmoch, Hans"] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "D01"] [Annotator "ChessBase II"] [PlyCount "125"] [EventDate "1930.07.13"] [EventType "team-tourn"] [EventRounds "17"] [EventCountry "GER"] [SourceTitle "EXT 2018"] [Source "ChessBase"] [SourceDate "2017.10.13"] [SourceVersion "1"] [SourceVersionDate "2017.10.13"] [SourceQuality "1"] [WhiteTeam "Netherlands"] [BlackTeam "Austria"] [WhiteTeamCountry "NED"] [BlackTeamCountry "AUT"] 1. d4 Nf6 2. Nc3 d5 3. Bg5 c6 4. e3 Nbd7 5. Nf3 Qb6 (5... Qa5 $1) 6. Rb1 e6 7. a3 c5 8. Be2 Be7 9. O-O O-O 10. Ne5 Qd8 11. f4 Nxe5 12. fxe5 Nd7 13. Bxe7 Qxe7 14. Qe1 f6 15. Qh4 Rf7 16. Bd3 f5 (16... g6) 17. Qxe7 Rxe7 18. Bxf5 $1 Nxe5 19. Bxh7+ Kxh7 20. dxe5 Bd7 21. Rf4 Kg8 22. Rbf1 Bc6 23. R1f2 Rd8 24. Ne2 Red7 25. Rh4 Rf7 26. Rh8+ Kxh8 27. Rxf7 d4 28. exd4 cxd4 29. Nf4 Rc8 30. Nxe6 Bd5 31. Rf8+ Rxf8 32. Nxf8 Kg8 33. Ng6 Be4 34. Nh4 Bxc2 35. Nf3 d3 36. Kf2 Kf7 37. Ke3 Ke6 38. Kd2 (38. g4) 38... Kd5 39. Ne1 Bb1 40. Nf3 Ke6 41. b3 Kd5 42. Kc3 Kc5 43. h4 Kd5 44. g4 Bc2 45. Kd2 Bxb3 46. h5 Ke4 47. g5 $1 Bg8 48. h6 gxh6 49. gxh6 Kd5 50. Ng5 Kxe5 51. Kxd3 Kd5 52. h7 Bxh7+ 53. Nxh7 b5 54. Nf6+ Kc5 55. Ne4+ Kd5 56. Nd2 Kc5 57. Nb3+ Kb6 58. Kd4 a5 59. Kd5 a4 60. Nc1 b4 61. axb4 Kb5 62. Na2 a3 63. Kd4 1-0

I checked in the tournament book (1931, published by L. Tóth) and the book claims that Kmoch was the first player versus Weenik in the Austria - Holland round 1 match played on July 13th 1930.

The score of the game is not given but the result is shown as 0-1 so some confusion there.

The same event has an encounter between Wagner and Larsen plus Krogius playing for Finland. Please send in your post cards to explain these happenings. Wagner beat Larsen with the Ruy Lopez.

This is what De Telegraaf had to say on it on 16 July (with excuses for any mistakes made in translation): "Weenink said something on move 62, believing that Kmoch was a nice fellow who could tolerate something, angrily pushed over the pieces and said: “with that talking in the game you distracted me and now I must lose.” Kmoch also submitted a protest with the arbiter – Robinow – as a Dutch journalist was playing over the game in the tournament hall. "

There definitely was a Finnish player called Krogius around that time - not sure if he was related to the later and recently deceased Russian GM (save perhaps very distantly) And of course Larsen is one of *the* commonest Danish surnames.

I think I'd have played one more move before resigning. Ka4 - you never know!