Cross-Pins

     Cross-pins or double pins are names for a rare and particularly interesting tactic.  Under certain conditions it can also be called the St. Andrew's Cross, counter-pins and combination pins.

     A cross-pin can be absolute, relative, a combination of the two or a multiple of pins. A cross-pin occurs when a pinning piece is itself pinned.

for example -

Here White wins a minor piece, thanks to a cross-pin -

Alexander Alekhine seemed to have had a penchant for cross-pins -

Nimzowitsch finds his own cross-pins against Marshall -

A classic counter-pin from "Improve Your Chess Now" by Jonathan Tisdall -

Cross-pinning, what else? -

One of the most famous cross-pins -

This last game, played between the Russian master Sergey von Freymann and his Hungarian counterpart, Leó Fleischmann Forgács, at the Tschigorin Memorial all-Russian tournament in St. Petersburg in 1909, is a shotgun blast of of pins, cross-pins, sacrifices, discovered checks and double checks that needs to be followed from the beginning.