From Triumph to Tragedy
Throughout history, there have been numerous chess players who have met tragic ends to their lives. From accidents to mental illnesses, the reasons behind these tragic endings are varied and often intertwined with the intense mental and emotional demands of the game of chess. We don't really know if the deaths of these individuals were planned by some people with malicious intent, or even the individuals themselves.
In this blog, I'll try to shed light on the tragic lives of these players and show you their best games.
Table Of Contents
Richard Selig Réti was an Austro-Hungarian (later Czechoslovak) chess player, author, and composer of endgame studies. He was one of the world's best players in the 1910s and 1920s.
In 1924, in New York, he defeated Capablanca, who had been undefeated for eight years, with an Anglo-Indian defense. Reti was known for being one of the main proponents of Hypermodernism.
Reti was definitely not completely winning at the end, but he had a good advantage. Capa could have fought back with something like Nc4 attacking the White Queen back, but Reti would probably win anyway.
Réti studies mathematics but he is not a dry mathematician, he plays for Vienna but he is not a Viennese, he is Hungarian by birth but he does not know Hungarian, he speaks fast and yet he acts prudently, and he will still become the best chess player in the world without reaching the crown of world champion - Savielly Tartakower
Though things were looking bright for Reti, in 1929, he was hit by a car while crossing the street in Prague. He was sent to a hospital in Prague to recover, but while there, he contracted scarlet fever and died.
Alexander Fyodorovich Ilyin, better known as Alexander Ilyin-Genevsky (Zhenevsky is also a common spelling used to represent his party), was a Soviet Chess master and politician of sorts. He was known as the "Genevan" as he was born there.
He was one of the founders of the Soviet Chess School and also contributed to chess openings. There's a variation of the Dutch Defense named after him.
Like Reti, Genevsky's best win is probably his win against Capablanca. Maybe it's a curse... we'll never know.
Capa was known for his wealth, his machine like chess thinking and also his... ego. He would always think he was the best (which he admittedly was) and would always underestimate his opponent. This happened in the Reti-game and happened here too. Capa thought his opponent was a weak player and launched a pawn attack which wasn't great for him.
Genevsky didn't have a lot of luck though. During World War I, he suffered from shell-shock (PTSD) and had to learn how to play chess for the second time as he had lost his memory. During the Russian Civil War in 1918, his wife shot herself.
In 1941, he died in a Nazi air raid on Lake Ladoga on a ship during the siege of Leningrad. Though this is the official reason given for his death, some think that he actually died during the Great Purge. Either way, it was a tragic way for him to go.
In 1896, The Women’s Chess Club of New-York was incorporated. The President was Mrs. Eliza Campbell Foot. Eliza Campbell Foot, born in Geneva (in New York!) on the 23rd of February, 1851 was the daughter of Samuel and Jane Foot. She was the youngest of her 6 siblings. She was also the first female chess author from the United States, with a book about Chess Puzzles.
Eliza C Foot was the cousin of Wilhelm Steinitz, one of the greatest players of his time. She also managed to defeat him in a blindfold game in 1893.
White is now winning as she can play Bc2, trying to distract the Black Bishop from stopping the a-pawn from promoting. If the Black bishops moves, White has a lot of ways of continuing this same idea to win.
Sadly, she was hit by a car and died after leaving the Manhattan Chess Club on a stormy night. She was walking across the street carrying an umbrella that blocked her view.
Johannes Minckwitz was a German chess master and journalist. He was born on the 11th of April in Leipzig. His father, a German writer who had the same name as him, encouraged his son to become a writer.
Minckwitz also liked composing chess puzzles. The master's first chess problems appeared as early as 1863. He subsequently received numerous awards for his compositions. He also appeared as a chess player around this time.
Minckwitz was one of the best chess players in Germany in the 1870s and the 1880s. He had wins against many great players including Steinitz, Anderssen, Alapin, Tarrasch and Mieses.
This was a very ugly loss for Steinitz. It's always surprising to see a famous name like Steinitz on the losing end of an embarrassing blunder, but it happens.
Around 1883, a mental disease became noticeable. Minckwitz was eventually moved to a psychiatric facility. After 1894, he was no longer permitted to compete in chess competitions, but he continued to write for a long period. In 1901, he was run over by a tram when in despair; the circumstances suggested that he planned to commit suicide, and he died the next day.
Achilles Frydman was a Polish chess player. He was born on the 19th of March, 1904. Before becoming a chess player, he supposedly worked as a clerk in a bank.
Achilles was also one of the best players for Poland in the 1930s but he had some medical issues. Upon his release from a psychiatric institute in 1937, he received a warning not to play chess. He did, however, participate in the 1937 Polish Chess Championship and had a nervous breakdown. After 15 of the 21 rounds in the tournament, he was unable to complete it.
In the book The Psychology of the Chess Player, Reuben Fine said that Frydman had yelled "Fire!" as he ran through the hotel without any clothing on. In one of his writings, George Koltanowski said that Frydman insisted on going around the lobby nude. According to a Polish newspaper article, Frydman had made a lot of problems for both the players and the event organizers. Gideon Stahlberg had the room next to Frydman and could not sleep because Frydman would yell “check” and “checkmate”.
In 1938, Achilles Frydman played Tartakower at a tournament in Lodz and turned up naked. Later on, Frydman was admitted to Kocborowo psychiatric hospital. He was taken into Nazi custody in Warsaw in 1940, and he passed away in a detention camp. This leads us to our next topic...
There have been some cases of war which were either caused by chess or caused harm to the chess world. Here's a short list of those events:
A Chess Game started a War
A chess match in Paris resulted in a fistfight between King Louis VI (1081-1137) of France and King Henry I (1068-1135) of England. According to one account, Louis flung the chessboard at Henry, while another claims that Henry struck Louis over the head with it. The people around them intervened to break up the altercation. It is said that this incident marked the beginning of the events that led to England and France being at war for nearly a decade.
The Nazi Raid in Warsaw
All of the chess players who were gathering at the Warsaw Chess Club, which the Germans had previously banned, were arrested by the authorities in March 1940. All of the Jews were sent to Danilowicowskia, a concentration camp located in Palmiry, Poland, which is north of Warsaw. There, they were executed in large numbers. Among them were the Polish masters Achilles Frydmann, Moishe Lowtzky, Stanislaw Kohn, and Dawid Przepiorka. Miguel Najdorf's entire family was killed along with 2,000 men and women who were arrested as well.
The Nazi Raid of London
On September 23, 1940, the National Chess Centre was burnt down in London during The German Blitzkreig, which began on September 7, 1940 and lasted until May 21, 1941. The Centre was managed by world women’s champion Vera Menchik.
The 13th Soviet Championship
Nazi Germany launched a massive surprise attack against the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941. As a result, the 13th Soviet Championship at Rostov-on-Don was called off. The majority of the staff, including the Chairman of the USSR Chess Federation, joined volunteer battalions and advanced to the front.
More Nazi Concentration Camps
Dr. Karel Treybal, Simon Rubinstein, Dr. Leon Monosson, Emil Zinner, Abram Szpiro, Wilhelm Orbach, Ladislaus Doery, Endre Steiner, Kornel Havasi, Salo Landau, George Koltanowski's family, members of the Polgar family and many others were killed at Nazi concentration camps. Most of the people listed here died of starvation or execution.
The Siege of Leningrad
Alexander Ilyin-Genevsky, Viktor Korchnoi's father, Samuil Vainshtein, Karl Leonid Kubbel, Alexey Troitzky, Mikhail Kogan, Ilya Rabinovich, Peter Romanovsky's entire family and many others died due to the Siege of Leningrad. Most of these people were starved to death and some of them were shot to death.
Conclusion
May everyone who died rest in peace. Death is something inevitable. The stories of these players serve as reminders of the fragility of life and the challenges that can accompany extraordinary talent and achievement.
Credit to Bill Wall for some of the information in this blog (1, 2)
I hope you enjoyed this blog and I'll see you soon. Have a good day!
