English Chess Forum

Players may not be aware, but Paul confided to me at the last match he captained for Worcestershire that his eye-sight was deteriorating and he would not be team captain for the 2025-6 season. I suspect his decision to resign the sercretary's role at stourbridge CC and found a new club at Kinver whe...

The family has told me the funeral is taking place on Weds 25 March at 11.30 at St Peter’s Church Kinver

It is with very great sadness that I have to report to you that Paul Sharratt, secretary of Worcestershire Chess Association, passed away suddenly. This has come as a great shock and was totally unexpected. He was CEO for the Midland Chess Counties Union, former President of the Birmingham Chess & D...

Eric Horwill reported to me the sad passing of Peter Keate, a former vice-captain of Worcestershire I team in 1965 and a Vice-President of Worcestershire Chess Association for nearly half a century. He died on 15 January. Peter shared the Worcestershire individual championship in the 1965/6 season w...

Longstanding stalwart of Hereford Chess Club and former county champion, Les Collard has passed away. Les was individual champion of Herefordshire first in 1966 and then went on to win the title four further times and shared the title on seven occasions most recently in 2010, a span of high class ch...

A sad loss! Joyce played in over 40 county matches for Worcestershire. Whenever I played away matches at Halesowen she always had a warm welcome. I Understand that she was a special needs teacher before she retired. Ray Collett (President Worcestershire Chess Association)

I learned that Tony West, former captain of Worcestershire correspondence team in the Brown Pond competition has passed away. The current team captain Jim Keene, wrote: "He was a team captain for the 2nd team Correspondence Chess for many years and assisted me in obtaining interested players. He onl...

Very sad to hear this news. I spoke to him only a few weeks or so ago in relation to playing for the Worcestershire Wolfpack online teams in 4NCL. Stourbridge CC website has a short appreciation of him at: http://www.stourbridgechess.force9.co.uk/News.htm

David William Pugh (Longbridge). With great sadness, the death is reported of David Pugh, President Longbridge CC, on 22 September after a long illness. David had been president of both Greenlands and then Longbridge CC. Steve Crees, secretary of Longbridge CC, has written a tribute to David on the...

A great loss for English chess. I first encountered Peter in my role as web editor for MCCU where I found him to be an excellent source of information about older players. He was chess correspondent for local newspapers and possibly the Birmingham Post. After several email exchanges, I met him to gi...

On 23 August 2022 Worcester & District League club representatives decided to merge with Worcestershire Chess Association. This brings to an end the independent existence of the District League, but its competitions live on. The District league, and the individual tournaments for the Bennett (open) ...

John Wrench (Kidderminster CC) has sent me a note that the Illustrated London News 1845 published in Staunton's column 'the birth of a Chess club' in Kidderminster - 'a pleasant little town, under the auspices of Mr Knight MP member of St George's'. The subscription was announced to be 20s which, ac...

For Worcester City Chess Club see the club's website at: http://www.raycollett.net/city/ It's likely that the most cost-effective anti-covid precautions will be players wearing face-coverings especially when sat at the board and provision of hand sanitiser. Obviously it costs nothing to make maximum...

Longbridge Chess Club, Birmingham history is at: <https://longbridgechess.wordpress.com/in-memory/>

Laurence was a larger than life chess player and part 4 of the history of Longbridge Chess Club (Birmingham) <https://longbridgechess.wordpress.com/in-memory/> by Steve Crees captures his spirit. Infuriating at times, but much less would have been achieved and now Birmingham and Worcestershire chess...