1956

[Kevin Thurlow]

The September 1956 edition of "The British Chess Magazine" contains a letter (page 244) from CH Henshaw on the thorny subject of time limits. He says, "Having lost, or ought to have lost, most of my games in the past season by blunders through time-pressure, may I plead for more reasonable time controls? It is bad enough to have to play county games at the near-skittles rate of 2.5 minutes a move, but when this becomes 30 moves in 75 minutes, it is the ruin of serious positional chess."

(I have converted fractions to avoid having to work out how to put them here.) CH stood for Charles Henry I believe. He played in the Stevenson Memorial at Bognor in 1959.

He continues at some length, and then,

"The short time control puts a premium on opportunism and a discount on strategy, and should be abolished."

"The BCF should do something towards this through the Grading Committee, and I suggest that no game having a time control worse than 40 moves in 2 hours should rank for grading."

Sorry Mr Henshaw, it got worse...

[MSoszynski]

Serious positional chess?

I recall a certain author claiming, in a deliberately critical review, that there were no truly positional players below master level, and therefore that a positional repertoire written for non-masters was misguided. This did not prevent him, much earlier in a co-written book of his own, from suggesting that club players should first decide whether they are tactical or positional when choosing a repertoire.

I do not name the author, as I do not have the sources to hand to quote him accurately, but the underlying points remain as matters of opinion.

[Jon D'Souza-Eva]

CH stood for Charles Henry I believe. He played in the Stevenson Memorial at Bognor in 1959.

He was Charles Henry Henshaw: Born 18th February, 1906. Died Basingstoke on 3rd June, 1975.
There is a shield named after him at Basingstoke Chess Club:
https://www.basingstokegazette.co.uk/ne ... aw-shield/

[Kevin Thurlow]

"There is a shield named after him at Basingstoke Chess Club:
https://www.basingstokegazette.co.uk/ne ... aw-shield/"

There is some irony in the shield being awarded to someone after a 5-minute game... I am always pleased to see people honoured with trophies and tribute tournaments, and he was obviously a useful player.

"Serious positional chess?"

A fair point - you could argue that tactics might require more time to calculate than positional ideas, that you might just "know"?

[Matt Mackenzie]

Reminds me of Northumberland's AGM in (I think) 1989. A proposal was made to do away with adjournments in league matches and move to quickplay finishes - this was narrowly voted down by the dinosaurs (it passed a few years later, but I had moved out of the area by then) But what sticks in my mind was the passionate declarations that this would "ruin the quality of play, especially in the ending". I might have taken it more seriously but for the fact some so vehement about this had grades well under 100 - whereas most of the stronger players supported the change.

[GrahamStuart]

CH stood for Charles Henry I believe. He played in the Stevenson Memorial at Bognor in 1959.

He was Charles Henry Henshaw: Born 18th February, 1906. Died Basingstoke on 3rd June, 1975.
There is a shield named after him at Basingstoke Chess Club:
https://www.basingstokegazette.co.uk/ne ... aw-shield/

He played for Hampshire from 1956 to 1969, (boards 7 to 33) and was a regular participant in the Hampshire Individual in the same period. Basingstoke Chess Club have a lot to thank him from. David Graham advised me of the following when adding details on Basingstoke Chess Club's history.

Over the years Basingstoke Chess club have had several venues. We believe they had spells at the Liberal club and the Conservative club before moving to Chineham House. This venue was very Spartan. However things were to change dramatically in 1974. Charles Henshaw a club member built an extension on his house called Maydene and appointed four trustees from the Basingstoke Bridge club. The condition Henshaw set was that the Chess club have Maydene one night a week that being Wednesday. It has been like that for the last 51 years.

https://hampshirechesshistory.co.uk/bas ... hess-club/

The Hampshire AGM minutes from 1957 comment that CH Henshaw was unhappy with the time control of 30 moves in 90 minutes, but after discussion the committee decided that the time control would not change.

https://hampshirechesshistory.co.uk/ham ... ship-1957/

[MJMcCready]

I used to think like that when I was young. I always felt 75mins was never enough.

[Roger de Coverly]

The Hampshire AGM minutes from 1957 comment that CH Henshaw was unhappy with the time control of 30 moves in 90 minutes, but after discussion the committee decided that the time control would not change.

I wonder what they did after move 30. Adjourn and continue at 20 moves an hour perhaps. Individual games and championships usually avoided adjudications.

30 in 90 minutes was a London league move rate in the early 1970s. Adjournment took place at the end of the session with the game continuing at 20 moves an hour. At move 60 I think, either player could insist on adjudication. With all matches at Central London locations, adjournments weren't a major pain if you worked nearby.

It most likely was not until the 1970s that players learned how to play quickly with the adoption of rapidplay tournaments and quickplay finishes.

To this day FIDE are reluctant to allow anything faster than a four hour session to count for the rating of top players.

[GrahamStuart]

The Hampshire AGM minutes from 1957 comment that CH Henshaw was unhappy with the time control of 30 moves in 90 minutes, but after discussion the committee decided that the time control would not change.

I wonder what they did after move 30. Adjourn and continue at 20 moves an hour perhaps. Individual games and championships usually avoided adjudications.

30 in 90 minutes was a London league move rate in the early 1970s. Adjournment took place at the end of the session with the game continuing at 20 moves an hour. At move 60 I think, either player could insist on adjudication. With all matches at Central London locations, adjournments weren't a major pain if you worked nearby.

It most likely was not until the 1970s that players learned how to play quickly with the adoption of rapidplay tournaments and quickplay finishes.

To this day FIDE are reluctant to allow anything faster than a four hour session to count for the rating of top players.

I am pretty sure for the Hampshire Individual the games were adjourned and likely played 20 moves per hour for the rest of the game. This is based on the 1961 tournament where the fourth round was delayed due to the number of adjournments. Before the war the time control was 20 moves per hour. Maybe it was changed as players could not commit to more than 3 hours.

I don't think there were any adjudications at this stage, although by the early 80's when they were played over 2 weekends with the time control 48 moves in 2 hours, and the controller would request either the players play on, or adjudicate at his discretion after 48 moves.

[Graham Borrowdale]

Fascinating to learn the history of the current Basingstoke premises, at which I must have played many congresses, rapid plays, and matches over the years. I must say, last time I was there it looked in need of modernisation, as they say. I hope the bequest includes provision for maintenance.
I do have some sympathy with Mr Henshaw on time controls, having been bought up on 40/2 hrs, which became 40/110 + 10m when adjs/adjuds were abolished, and now is typically 80m + 10s. It does tend to make endgame play superficial, unless you manage to bank time earlier. As a time trouble addict, I would be in time trouble whatever the time control, so that is not an option!

[Ian Thompson]

I must say, last time I was there it looked in need of modernisation, as they say. I hope the bequest includes provision for maintenance.

Money has been made available from somewhere. Last time I went there, in November 2024, it was being extended. There are some photos here of what it now looks like.

[GrahamStuart]

I must say, last time I was there it looked in need of modernisation, as they say. I hope the bequest includes provision for maintenance.

Money has been made available from somewhere. Last time I went there, in November 2024, it was being extended. There are some photos here of what it now looks like.

The article states the below
The ambitious renovation project was funded through a combination of the club’s own reserves and a grant from Hampshire and the Isle of Wight Charitable Organisation.

The venue does have a lot more space now and hopefully will be there for many years.

[Graham Borrowdale]

I must say, last time I was there it looked in need of modernisation, as they say. I hope the bequest includes provision for maintenance.

Money has been made available from somewhere. Last time I went there, in November 2024, it was being extended. There are some photos here of what it now looks like.

The article states the below
The ambitious renovation project was funded through a combination of the club’s own reserves and a grant from Hampshire and the Isle of Wight Charitable Organisation.

The venue does have a lot more space now and hopefully will be there for many years.

Thanks for the further information, that is good to know, and it certainly looks a good facility now.

[MJMcCready]

Chess in the 50s played in clubs in England can be found on youtube.

[Paul Habershon]

I wonder if the Henshaw in this thread is rel
ated to the late J C Henshaw, a 190 player who played for Brighton

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