Here is the current working copy of the file: http://www.saund.co.uk/britbase/pgn/191 ... iewer.html
I have not put any links to it from elsewhere on the Britbase site so this is currently an EC Forum exclusive! I've put the link here so that those interested can see what I have (and haven't got) and generally proof-read.
I was tempted to give this thread the header "Alas Smith and Brown". The 1910 BCF Congress had two prominent Smiths and two Browns. Messrs SF Smith and FS Smith both played in the championship proper. Thankfully the Times reports took to referring to SF (Stephen Francis) Smith as "Dr Smith", with the occasional references simply to "Smith" being FS Smith. All that remains to find are FS Smith's forenames. We know he was a member of Oxford City Chess Club. And I am aware I'm not the first person to raise the Smith conundrum here...
... so I turn the problem over to Richard 'Whichnamefinder General' James in the hope that he will come to the rescue, as he has done so many times before.Gerard Killoran wrote:As for S. F. Smith and F. S. Smith, don't get me started!
The Browns are less of an issue on this occasion as Fred Brown played in the Championship and Frank Brown in the Major Open. At least I like to think it's not a problem: please tell me if you think different.
Other names to be teased out: E Funk and APT Kerr (both Major Open). And a middle name: John A Lewis (championship). One other name issue: thanks to an excellent biography written by Brian Denman, we know the full name of William Alfred Paley Hughes, but for ChessBase player indexing purposes I'm never quite sure whether to treat the surname as "Paley Hughes" (hyphenated or unhyphenated) or "Hughes" (treating "Paley" as the last of his middle names). Any advice on this? I have similar misgivings about other double-barrelled chessists.
I noticed, incidentally, that the special guest giving out the prizes at the 1910 BCF Congress finale was the Rev. William Archibald Spooner, warden of New College, Oxford. (See the Times, 29 August 1910). I'll leave it to the forum to concoct possible spoonerisms that he might have said to Atkins on presenting him with the Championship trophy, but, be warned if you do: you run the risk of seeing your composed words quoted as fact by those of the chess writing fraternity who prefer not to spend their afternoons combing through online archives.