Hampshire County Matches 1931 / 32

Hampshire played five over the board county matches this season, winning three and losing two. However, this was a better performance than it initially looked, as they won Montague-Jones Cup and only lost to Dorset, where Hampshire fielded an understrength team, and Middlesex in the final of the Shannon Cup. As can be seen from the match results Middlesex’s team was extremely strong in this match.

This season was also the last time which Joseph Blake played for Hampshire, who had been pretty much ever present since Hampshire’s first match in 1887. He continued to play chess though, and won the Kingston club championship several times, including in 1949 when he was 90 years old!

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For the record of Hampshire County matches, and links to any articles I have written, the table on the Hampshire County Chess Matches page will detail these. The Hampshire County Chess History page summaries the leagues Hampshire have played in, and the successes Hampshire have achieved. Both of these are available from the menu at the top of the site as well.

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Hampshire continued to be in a group with just Dorset and they met twice to determine who would progress to the knock out stages of the Montague-Jones Cup.

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Hampshire 13½ – Dorset 6½ – 24th Oct 1931 – Bournemouth

The first match against Dorset was held in late October, and as usual was played in Bournemouth. Hampshire were comfortable winners and the Hampshire Advertiser reported on the match the following week.

Hampshire vs Dorset 24th October 1931

At Gervis Hall last Saturday, the Dorset players put up a spirited resistance, and it was not to the concluding stages that the superior strategy of the Hampshire brought its toll. The teams were entertained to tea by the President, Brigadier-General F. Muspratt and members of the Bournemouth Chess Club.

The. match arrangements were ably carried through under the capable supervision of Mr HL Gardiner, the Bournemouth match secretary. Messrs CF Chapman. TY Carter and EW Houghton made first appearances for Hampshire of considerable promise, whilst GP Britton the Taunton School student and present Champion of Hampshire, had a favourable match at board 5.

Hampshire Advertiser – Saturday 31 October 1931

In the match the first 16 boards counted towards the Montague Jones and the full 20 for the SCCU. Hampshire were comfortable winners 13½ – 6½, and 11 – 5 in the 1st stage of the Montague Jones Cup. Hampshire scored heavily on the top boards, with 4½ points on the top 5 boards.

The Western Morning News mentioned that Dorset were missing a number of key players and highlighted that it was the total from the two matches would determine who would progress to the knock out stages. With the large lead this would be a big ask for Dorset in the 2nd match.

Hampshire winners were JH Blake, FJH Elwell, HD Lloyd. WJ Fry, HL Streeter, H Grover, TY Carter, FL Taylor, EW Haughton, JW Webster, Brig-Gen GF Muspratt and Miss ML Harrison.

Miss Mary Louise Harrison only represented Hampshire when playing Dorset, but scored two wins, two draws and two losses in her six matches. She also played in the British Ladies Championship in 1931, 1936 and 1939, finishing in 9th, 9th and 12th place respectively.

An indication of her strength was that she drew against Sir George Thomas when he played the Bournemouth Chess Club in a simul in 1934

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Hampshire 9 – Dorset 11 – 12th Dec 1931 – Bournemouth

Hampshire met Dorset, again in December in the 2nd round of the competition and Dorset achieved their first win in their matches against Hampshire. They had scored an 8-8 drawn in Oct 1929 (although there were some extra friendly games which gave Hampshire the win).

The Western Morning News mentioned that Dorset were strengthened the brothers Dr DB Kitchen and EH Kitchen, who had returned to active chess after a 30 year break. The brothers both won.

Hampshire were missing some key players, including JHJ Blake, but this does not take anything away from Dorset, who were deserving winners. Hampshire winners were FJH Elwell, WJ Fry, HL Streeter, TY Carter, JM Harris and JP Kirby.

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Hampshire 10 – Devon 6 – 20th February 1932 – Salisbury

Hampshire met Devon in the semi-final of the Montague Jones Cup and Devon were the ones who travelled this time, as the venue was Salisbury. I would expect this to be one of the overriding factors in the match and Hampshire won by four points. There was some discussion as to if the match was to be played in Salisbury or Southampton, but the sensible decision to play in Salisbury was made. The venue was the Red Lion Hotel, which still exists today and has been a hotel for more than 800 years.

The Western Morning News probably had the best match report, and this did mention the disadvantage of the travelling, with key players missing. It also said Hampshire were not fully represented either.

Westcountry Chess Devon’s defeat by Hampshire

Devon came a cropper against Hampshire at Salisbury on Saturday, and now have no further direct interest in the destination of the Montague-Jones Cup, which trophy they secured last season.

Neither county was fully represented, but the long railway journey penalized Devonians particularly, and they were without the services of JB Goodman and JT Mather (Plymouth), HJH Cope (Ilfracombe), and HJ Stretton (Exeter). a serious responsibility was thus thrown the lower boards.

It is interesting to note that the first half of the team held their own, while the two bottom boards had advantage. From 9 to 14, however, Devon obtained only half a point —and there the explanation of their failure. At the same time, the games were well fought out, and although the fortunes of war favoured Hampshire throughout the final decision was only reached on adjudication of several games unfinished at the call of time

Western Morning News – Wednesday 24 February 1932

The Devon’s board 1 and 2 were swapped round compared to last year but F Pitt-Fox lost to JH Blake and RM Bruce beat FJH Elwell. Last year JH Blake lost and FJH Elwell won.

Hampshire winners were JH Blake, HD Lloyd, AB Coe, Revd HF Hawkes, CF Chapman, H Grover, HM Southon, F Taylor and HL Gardiner.

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Hampshire 10½ – Hertfordshire 5½ – 19th March 1932 – London

It was not long until Hampshire meat Hertfordshire in the final of the Montague Jones Cup, and they had a comfortable 5 points win.

JH Blake was meant to play GSA Wheatcroft on board 1, but the newspaper report has Wheatcroft as absent (the Hampshire records mention his name). This would have been their fourth pairing in County matches and Blake had won the previous three, it could be that Wheatcroft was pleased to see Blake retiring from county chess as he won both his other games against Hampshire when not facing Blake.

Hampshire winners were JH Blake (by default, in his last ever game for Hampshire), HD Lloyd, WJ Fry, HA Way, Revd HF Hawkes, CF Chapman, FL Taylor and GT Lloyd. A fragment of one game from the match was published in the Hampshire Advertiser, although this was AB Coe’s loss to EJ Fairchild. I think the continuation was probably not what was played in the game, as Black missed a win. It was likely another move was played and the game was adjudicated as a win for Hertfordshire.

Board	Hampshire	Colour	Result	Herts	Colour	Result
1	JH Blake	White	1	GSA Wheatcroft	Black	0
2	FJH Elwell	Black	½	FW Flear	White	½
3	HD Lloyd	White	1	FN Braund	Black	0
4	WJ Fry	Black	1	AG Fellows	White	0
5	HA Way	White	1	GPA Richards	Black	0
6	AB Coe	Black	0	EJ Fairchild	White	1
7	Revd HF Hawkes	White	1	EG Attenborough	Black	0
8	CT Bennett	Black	½	J Hakannon	White	½
9	CF Chapman	White	1	AH Knight	Black	0
10	HL Streeter	Black	0	HG Warren	White	1
11	Revd W Proctor	White	0	Mrs TH Wheelwright	Black	1
12	HM Southon	Black	½	R Lee-Johnson	White	½
13	Capt GP Britton	White	0	GK Trotter	Black	1
14	AS Dance	Black	0	FH Burn	White	1
15	FL Taylor	White	1	EN Fox	Black	0
16	GT Lloyd	Black	1	R Pockett	White	0
	Total		10½	Total		5½

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Hampshire 3 – Middlesex 13 – 7th May 1932 – London

Hampshire met Middlesex in the final of the Shannon competition and Hampshire obviously tried to field a very strong team, although they were missing JH Blake. Sir GA Thomas did play, as did JW Rivkine in his only game he played for Hampshire. He is not a player I am aware of, but playing board three looks like he was a strong player.

It is worth looking at some of Middlesex’s team.

• JH Morrison – Played in three British Championships with his best performance in 1929 with an equal 4th place
• Sultan Khan – Not sure why he was playing on board two (maybe to face Sir GA Thomas?)
• EG Sergeant – Regular British Chess Championship entrant
• H Saunders – Played in several British Championships
• PW Sergeant – Who played board 15 was strong enough to play in the 1921 British Championship

There was a reason that Middlesex were dominant in the SCCU at this time and looking at the team which faced Hampshire, that reason was the amount of top players they had available.

Sultan Khan and Sir George Thomas actually played against each other several times in 1932. The 1932 “Sunday Referee” Masters the 1932 Cambridge Premier, the 1932 British Chess Championship and the1932/33 Hastings Premier. Sultan Khan usually came out on top, but he was held to a draw in this match.

The sole Hampshire winner was WJ Fry.

There was a game position in the Hampshire Advertiser and again it was a game where Hampshire Secretary AB Coe was playing, but had a winning position. Only the position where Coe had a winning combination was included and the game ended in a draw.

Board	Hampshire	Colour	Result	Middlesex	Colour	Result
1	FJH Elwell	White	0	JH Morrison	Black	1
2	Sir GA Thomas	Black	½	Sultan Khan	White	½
3	JW Rivkin	White	0	EG Sergeant	Black	1
4	HD Lloyd	Black	0	H Saunders	White	1
5	WJ Fry	White	1	CA Damant	Black	0
6	HA Way	Black	0	EG Twitchett	White	1
7	AB Coe	White	½	J Strachstein	Black	½
8	Revd HF Hawkes	Black	0	HF Myers	White	1
9	CF Chapman	White	0	A Mercer	Black	1
10	HL Streeter	Black	½	A West	White	½
11	Capt GP Britton	White	0	SH Crockett	Black	1
12	Revd W Proctor	Black	0	A Stow	White	1
13	H Grover	White	0	E Brown	Black	1
14	AS Dance	Black	0	H Israel	White	1
15	FL Taylor	White	½	PW Sergeant	Black	½
16	GT Lloyd	Black	0	RG Armstrong	White	1
	Total		3	Total		13

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JH Blake

As mentioned this was the last season that Joseph Blake played for Hampshire. I will leave it to others to go into details on his life, but will summarise some of his Hampshire Chess achievements. Hampshire were obviously lucky to have strong player, but what makes him different to other top Hampshire players such as GH Thomas, CHOD Alexander, William Winter of the past, and more recent players Tony Kosten, Peter Wells, Steven Jones and Andrew Martin, was the amount of games he played for Hampshire, and longevity of his career.

Hampshire’s first match was the friendly against Sussex in 1887 where Blake played on his normal board one (and won). According to my records he played 113 times for Hampshire from 1887 to 1932 with all but two of the games on board 1 (he played on board 2 behind TE Haydon and Sir GA Thomas in these matches). Understandably that Sir George Thomas would play on board 1, but not sure the reason for the other time. He won 70 of his games, drew 26 and lost just 18 games (one result was unknown as was adjudicated and I could not find the decision).

As well as his great playing performance, he also held the President’s role from 1927 to 1933, was Match Captain (1890/91 season to 1932/33, plus the matches before Hampshire were an official organisation. He was also one of Hampshire’s delegates to the SCCU from 1895 to 1935.

I would say he would go down as the most prominent Hampshire County chess player¹.

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Summary

A summary of the county matches and the general chess activities in Hampshire. The Hampshire Advertiser normally had details on the AGM, but I cannot locate details this year. This is a shame, as it probably would have had more details on JH Blake as well as the normal activities.

As mentioned Hampshire won the Montague Jones Cup, but Middlesex were much too strong in the Shannon competition. On the Correspondence front Hampshire only played the one match where they finished 8th in the Counties Championship. The individual results for all but the Counties championship are in the archives and can be seen in the FA Taylor document.

In the Hampshire league Portsmouth won Division One and Andover ii Division Two.

The winner of the HCA Individual Championship was Frank Elwell. Elwell won all four games in his section and then his five games in the final for a comprehensive performance. This was the first time the competition was not a knock out competition, as reported in the Hampshire Advertiser. The three initial sections were also seeded.

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The HCA officers remained unchanged:

• JH Blake – President
• AB Coe – Hon. Secretary and Treasurer
• JH Blake – Match Captain
• FJH Elwell, HW Benest – Hon. Auditors
• JH Blake, HA Way & AB Coe – SCCU Delegates

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Acknowledgements and Sources

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1. Other candidates for this position would be Frank Elwell who played 128 times between 1891 and 1939 and Gillian Moore with at least 300 games (1960 – 2025, and still playing). ↩︎