Britbase Updates

Historical knowledge and information regarding our great game.
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Gerard Killoran
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Britbase Updates

Post by Gerard Killoran » Sat Apr 16, 2022 1:57 pm

I thought I'd start a thread devoted to supplying games and other information relevant to John Saunders and the Britbase website.

To kick off, here's a smooth win by B. H. Wood. Who knew failure to castle could prove disastrous?


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Gerard Killoran
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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by Gerard Killoran » Sat Apr 16, 2022 6:54 pm

Atkins' opponent was W. T. Stallmann who must have been, Wilhelm (also William) Thomas Stallmann d.o.b. 7th May 1863.


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MJMcCready
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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by MJMcCready » Sat Apr 16, 2022 10:14 pm

Gerard Killoran wrote:
Sat Apr 16, 2022 1:57 pm
I thought I'd start a thread devoted to supplying games and other information relevant to John Saunders and the Britbase website.

To kick off, here's a smooth win by B. H. Wood. Who knew failure to castle could prove disastrous?

Even in the 70s Baruch was a very strong player I seem to remember.

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John Saunders
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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by John Saunders » Sat Apr 16, 2022 11:22 pm

Thanks for starting this thread, Gerard. Contributions to BritBase are always welcome. I may post a few items here myself where I turn up a game which is a one-off or doesn't fit under a particular tournament or player heading. I found one such game earlier today, won by Sir George Newnes against the chess journalist Leopold Hoffer. Had I interviewed Hoffer after this game I should have been tempted to ask him a variation of the famous Mrs Merton to Debbie McGee question: "how do you explain your loss to the generous chess benefactor Sir George Newnes?"

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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by Gerard Killoran » Sun Apr 17, 2022 12:03 pm

Perhaps Newnes was our own Prince Dadian of Mingrelia.

Meanwhile here's some games from the third-class tournament at Crystal Palace 1907. The first is a fine example of bitter-endism.







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Matt Mackenzie
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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by Matt Mackenzie » Sun Apr 17, 2022 6:33 pm

Even "third class" players these days don't play the Giuoco Piano like Black did there :shock:

In contrast, the two other games are much more modern looking.
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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by Gerard Killoran » Mon Apr 18, 2022 3:33 pm

This batch includes a rare game by John Keeble. His opponent, W. A. Davidson was from Sidcup and played for Kent. Can anyone put names to the initials?









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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by John Saunders » Mon Apr 18, 2022 4:28 pm

Gerard Killoran wrote:
Mon Apr 18, 2022 3:33 pm
This batch includes a rare game by John Keeble. His opponent, W. A. Davidson was from Sidcup and played for Kent. Can anyone put names to the initials?
Not yet but I'm on the hunt. The only sliver of info I can add so far is that W. A. Davidson was listed as being a member of the Royal Arsenal CC in 1935/36 (source: English Counties Combined Yearbook for that season) and was still affiliated to the same club in 1946/47.
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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by John Saunders » Mon Apr 18, 2022 7:12 pm

Thanks for today's batch of games, Gerard - I've posted them on BritBase.

Not too much luck with finding forenames for W A Davidson. Kevin Thurlow's book A History of Chess in the English Civil Service has a reference to a game W A Davidson played for said organisation in 1934. There was one person in the 1939 Census who looked like he could be our man: William A Davidson, born 4 November 1872, lived in Bourne Road, Bexley (within 1½ miles of Sidcup) and was a police pensioner. (And we know the Met Police played in the Civil Service League.) But I looked closer and discovered that it was a transcription error: he was actually William W Davidson, originally from Aberdeen with the full name William Wright Davidson. D'oh!
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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Mon Apr 18, 2022 7:16 pm

More on Arthur Percival Lacy-Hulbert here:

https://www.shropshirechess.org/about/h ... 1930-1939/
Reverend AP Lacy-Hulbert (b.1877 Nice – d. 1966 Ludlow)
County Secretary 1929-1953
This tireless worker, administrator, writer and player laid the foundations of Shropshire Chess as we know it.
With a biography and a game against R. Bonham from the Midlands Championship of 1934.

How would I check if that 1934 game is in Britbase?

Found the Britbase details for Lacy-Hulbert here (together with the game I mentioned):

https://www.britbase.co.uk/britbase/pgn ... biog1.html

Does anyone know who the 'D Everington' is that annotated the version on the Shropshire chess history website?

Ah, a modern annotator, not a contempory, see:

https://www.shropshirechess.org/what-th ... verington/
viewtopic.php?f=46&t=11392

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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by John Saunders » Mon Apr 18, 2022 7:30 pm

Christopher Kreuzer wrote:
Mon Apr 18, 2022 7:16 pm
More on Arthur Percival Lacy-Hulbert here:

https://www.shropshirechess.org/about/h ... 1930-1939/
Reverend AP Lacy-Hulbert (b.1877 Nice – d. 1966 Ludlow)
County Secretary 1929-1953
This tireless worker, administrator, writer and player laid the foundations of Shropshire Chess as we know it.
With a biography and a game against R. Bonham from the Midlands Championship of 1934.

How would I check if that 1934 game is in Britbase?
I've visited that excellent Shropshire chess history site many times.

As regards finding games on BritBase: games are batched into tournaments (as per ChessBase), not by player (as per Chessgames.com), so you need to visit the 1930s page at BritBase - https://www.saund.org.uk/britbase/brit30.htm- to see if there is a file for the 1934 Midlands tournament - and there isn't. So you know it's not there.

I have toyed with the idea with setting up a file of miscellaneous games for a given year or decade but have never got around to doing anything about it as I have more than enough to occupy me as it is. I've recently been busy finalising results and games for the Varsity match here: https://www.saund.org.uk/britbase/varsitychess.html - the results of all Varsity matches are now available, plus several hundred of the games. I've also compiled biographical info on players who took part in the Varsity match from 1873 to 1959 and it's close to completion. It's a massive file. About 25 years' work!
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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Mon Apr 18, 2022 7:37 pm

Thanks, John. Sorry for the cross-posting, as I edited my post to say I had found that info, but before you posted. That Varsity biographical info page is hugely impressive. Especially that it is close to completion!

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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by Brian Denman » Wed Apr 20, 2022 2:43 pm

If people are looking for games by Rev A P Lacy-Hulbert, I believe that he wrote a chess column for a while in the Kington Times, The column started in the early 1930s and with a probable break for the war may have gone well into the 1950s. The trouble is that I cannot remember what years the vicar edited it.

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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by Gerard Killoran » Wed Apr 20, 2022 6:43 pm

More from 1938







Last edited by Gerard Killoran on Wed Apr 20, 2022 10:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Britbase Updates

Post by Matt Mackenzie » Wed Apr 20, 2022 10:20 pm

Erm, can't Black just play 25...Qf5 at the end of that last one?? I think something might have been misrecorded somewhere.
"Set up your attacks so that when the fire is out, it isn't out!" (H N Pillsbury)

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