Chess history trivia

[John Townsend]

Thank you, David, and well done.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

A very tragic end:

https://tartajubow.blogspot.com/2017/05 ... nolds.html

[John Saunders]

"Your starter for ten: who played chess for Buckinghamshire, helped revive Marlow Chess Club..."

(buzzer sounds - voice-over...) "Smartarse College, Oxbridge!"

"Roger de Coverly!"

"That's an incorrect interruption, five point penalty to Smartarse College, the full question goes to EC Forum Chess Historians... who played chess for Buckinghamshire, helped revive Marlow Chess Club, and once beat Capablanca in a simul?"

[Jon D'Souza-Eva]

Cecil Hunter Reid:
https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1826374

[John Saunders]

Cecil Hunter Reid:
https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1826374

Yes, well done, Jon. I'm impressed that you got his full name which isn't on the chessgames website (though it does now appear on BritBase). It took me some time to find it myself when I researched it the other day. One of my sources was the history of Buckinghamshire County Chess Association 1932-1982 which the late Alan Cox put together for the county's 50th anniversary. I've put together a short biography of Reid on my Varsity match biography page (though he never actually played in the match proper). I don't think he was a particularly strong player, despite playing top board for Bucks a few times. But then the same could be said of me!

[Jon D'Souza-Eva]

Well his game against Capablanca was very impressive!

I fleshed out his family tree on the Family Search website:
https://www.familysearch.org/tree/perso ... s/LCLT-BZS

[John Saunders]

A couple of passages from Alan Cox's history of Bucks chess might be of interest.

The first is by a former Bucks player, Arthur Passant.

In 1946 I moved to the Marlow area and, assisted by one or two Borlase masters, revived the Marlow club. We were fortunate in having the solid support of C.H. Reid, one-time president of the Bucks Association, ex-judge and member of London’s Imperial Club.

The late 1940s revival of Marlow CC didn't last long. I believe Roger de C and some of his Borlase [Marlow Grammar School] colleagues attempted something similar around 1970 but it too didn't last. Or maybe it morphed into Bourne End CC which has of course thrived ever since.

The first record of a county individual championship indicates that C.H. Reid of High Wycombe who later became President of the County Association was the winner in 1932/33.

Reid was president of the Bucks CCA from 1937 to 1946.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

I am hoping my question has just flummoxed everyone, but just in case it got lost in the flurry above, here it is again (I have added slightly more information):

Which chess player, who came to Britain as a young child and died in London in the Second World War, led a team that played (and lost) a consultation game in 1923 against a team led by Alekhine?

[John Saunders]

Well his game against Capablanca was very impressive!

I fleshed out his family tree on the Family Search website:
https://www.familysearch.org/tree/perso ... s/LCLT-BZS

Thanks for that. I spent some time doing much the same a few days ago. Reid didn't make the Varsity match team but I found evidence of him playing chess for his college (Caius) against local Cambridge clubs when he was 'up'. No evidence of his playing any more chess until his retirement as a judge in India in 1927/28, but beating Capablanca was a good start! That said, the cynical side of me calls into question the standard of Capa's play in that game. He was unrecognisable. I made a note of the source in my (offline) record of the game: "Source: Surrey Mirror - Friday 14 December 1928. Capablanca scored +29, =2, -1. The draws were with Sir Horace Plunkett, KCVO, and Col. Edwards." So he loses to a judge and draws with an ex-MP and high-ranking army officer. Were these diplomatic results against influential figures? It always looks a bit brutal or discourteous when the simul-giver wipes out the opposition by 100% so perhaps Capa set his cerebral chess playing engine to Level 1 against a few of his better connected opponents to avert this possibility. It reminds me slightly of the story of Spassky playing informal games against people at posh dinners and amusing himself by forcing them to beat him.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

The draws were with Sir Horace Plunkett, KCVO, and Col. Edwards." So he loses to a judge and draws with an ex-MP and high-ranking army officer. Were these diplomatic results against influential figures? It always looks a bit brutal or discourteous when the simul-giver wipes out the opposition by 100% so perhaps Capa set his cerebral chess playing engine to Level 1 against a few of his better connected opponents to avert this possibility. It reminds me slightly of the story of Spassky playing informal games against people at posh dinners and amusing himself by forcing them to beat him.

Interesting. Capablanca would have been the sort to know who he was playing against (some simul. givers would have not had that level of social 'smoothness', you know what I mean). You would have to know who the 29 wins were against, as some of them may have been influential as well. He couldn't let everyone influential win... (if your theory is correct, and we must remind ourselves it is only a theory).

[John Saunders]

I am hoping my question has just flummoxed everyone, but just in case it got lost in the flurry above, here it is again (I have added slightly more information):

Which chess player, who came to Britain as a young child and died in London in the Second World War, led a team that played (and lost) a consultation game in 1923 against a team led by Alekhine?

Sorry to have deluged the thread with a different bit of trivia and swamped your own item, but that's just the way the forum cookie crumbles, isn't it?

The first answer to your question that springs to mind is Vera Menchik. Too obvious? Do I hear the QI bells and klaxons sounding? OK, maybe Olga Menchik. More klaxons? (I haven't resorted to my many sources of info on the period in question, just my senescent brain.)

[Christopher Kreuzer]

I am hoping my question has just flummoxed everyone, but just in case it got lost in the flurry above, here it is again (I have added slightly more information):

Which chess player, who came to Britain as a young child and died in London in the Second World War, led a team that played (and lost) a consultation game in 1923 against a team led by Alekhine?

Sorry to have deluged the thread with a different bit of trivia and swamped your own item, but that's just the way the forum cookie crumbles, isn't it?

The first answer to your question that springs to mind is Vera Menchik. Too obvious? Do I hear the QI bells and klaxons sounding? OK, maybe Olga Menchik. More klaxons? (I haven't resorted to my many sources of info on the period in question, just my senescent brain.)

double klaxons

Male, not female. The family were diplomats, which may help? (Unlike John [Townsend] I give clues! )

[John Saunders]

I am hoping my question has just flummoxed everyone, but just in case it got lost in the flurry above, here it is again (I have added slightly more information):

Sorry to have deluged the thread with a different bit of trivia and swamped your own item, but that's just the way the forum cookie crumbles, isn't it?

The first answer to your question that springs to mind is Vera Menchik. Too obvious? Do I hear the QI bells and klaxons sounding? OK, maybe Olga Menchik. More klaxons? (I haven't resorted to my many sources of info on the period in question, just my senescent brain.)

double klaxons

Male, not female. The family were diplomats, which may help? (Unlike John [Townsend] I give clues! )

The clue made it too easy - Adrián García Conde.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Sorry to have deluged the thread with a different bit of trivia and swamped your own item, but that's just the way the forum cookie crumbles, isn't it?

The first answer to your question that springs to mind is Vera Menchik. Too obvious? Do I hear the QI bells and klaxons sounding? OK, maybe Olga Menchik. More klaxons? (I haven't resorted to my many sources of info on the period in question, just my senescent brain.)

double klaxons

Male, not female. The family were diplomats, which may help? (Unlike John [Townsend] I give clues! )

The clue made it too easy - Adrián García Conde.

Am still impressed that you got it!

He did well to tie for first at the Premier A section at Margate. He played Alekhine individually in the lightning event organised at Margate 1938. Maybe someone can post the consultation game from 1923? Apparently the "best game ever played in Hull". Back to Margate 1938:

https://www.saund.org.uk/britbase/pgn/1 ... iewer.html

The BCM report stated:

[Conde] should have been classed in the foreign entries under Mexico but has been with us so long that we cannot help regarding him as a member of the English contingent

More here:

https://mannchess.org.uk/People/Conde,% ... Garcia.htm

Have not been able to find the cause of death (aged 57). Does not appear to have been a civilian war death (obviously people died of other causes as well). Would that be in the public record now, or still restricted?

[Matt Mackenzie]

A very tragic end:

https://tartajubow.blogspot.com/2017/05 ... nolds.html

I recall his sensational win against Reuben Fine being featured in an early edition of Chess magazine.