British Empire chess players

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Does anyone know how common it was for chess player from the Colonies (this was a formal term back then, distinguishing them from the Dominions and India) to travel to play chess in the British Chess Championships? This would largely be the pre-Second World War period. I am not sure when the transition to "Commonwealth" chess players took place during the period when large parts of the former British Empire gained independence or other similar status. The well-known example is Sultan Khan, but I am not sure how well known others are.

Anyway, this was prompted by searches for British Guiana and chess in the 1930s bringing up some nice photos of the British Guiana player J. A. M. Osborn:

https://www.gettyimages.co.nz/detail/ne ... /526755961

Chess player J A M Osborn, from British Guiana, playing a game at the annual chess tournament of the British Chess Federation, Yarmouth, England, July 11th 1935.

I wonder if more is known about him?

Ah, I see John Saunders has trodden this path earlier...

https://johnchess.blogspot.com/2018/04/ ... itish.html

This is J A M Osborn, from British Guiana (as it then was), who played in the First Class B section and scored 4½/11. Does anyone know his forenames? The photo is dated 11 July 1935.

The answer is in a reply at that blog two years later:

JAM Osborn was my grandfather. John Alan Milton Osborn. My father was Frank Leonard Osborn who played at the 1946 Nottingham chess congress. I remember seeing a newspaper cutting talking about JAM travelling 3,000 (from Guiana) to play chess at the Margate (Cliftonville) chess congress in 1914?/. Any further info on this would be appreciated, as I am researching the ancestors I never met. The family (dad, grandad and great granddad) were all Guiana chess champions and the venue for the Guiana chess club was in our home 190 Church St. Georgetown. Having left Guyana in 1961 before the troubles, I have no more info and am now trying trace family history.

I have left out the email address details (they are on the blog comment), in case anyone does have more information and wants to contact Terry.

I did find a brief excavation from Chess Amateur found by Edward Winter:

https://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/corn.html

A markedly lame batch of ‘Chess Conundrums on the War’ by J.A.M. Osborn appeared on page 193 of the Chess Amateur, April 1917.

I suppose one starting point would be to try and establish the names of the "dad, grandad and great granddad" of Terry Osborn who were all Guiana chess champions. J. A. M. Osborn was the middle one, the grandfather. The father (as stated above) was Frank Leonard Osborn. Who was the great-grandfather?

[Richard James]

Other sources suggest he was James Allan Milton Osborn, not John Alan.

Online trees also give his father's name as William Augustus Osborn. They appear to have been in what is now Guyana for several generations