Southsea 1950

The Bogoljubow vs Trott ending was a rare bird

     The annual Agnes Stevenson Memorial, an open tournament, was played in the 1950s and 1960s with Southsea being the venue from 1949 to 1952. Mrs. Stevenson was a British Ladies Champion who met an untimely end in 1935 when she accidentally walked into an airplane propeller. 
     The 1950 tournament was Arthur Bisguier's first international success in Europe and Jonathan Penrose created a sensation by defeating both Tartakower and Bogoljubow. His loss to Bisguier in the eighth round knocked him out of first into a tie for third place. 
     There's also an interesting anecdote concerning Tartakower that relates to the Wesley So incident when he was forfeited at the US Championship for writing noted on his scoresheet. In The Chess Masters on Winning Chess by Fred Reinfeld he wrote, “Tartakower had a fluent pen; he wrote voluminously, often annotating a game for a newspaper or magazine while he was playing it.” 
     Leonard Barden wrote that he witnessed Tartakower making notes during at least one game, at one or more of the Southsea tournaments of 1949, 1950 and 1951. Barden related that in Tartakower's game against Ravn at Southsea, 1951 he (Barden) was curious to see what Tartakower was writing and so crept up behind him and found there were copious notes in small writing on his scoresheet.  He went on to say that apparently Tartakower had trouble reading his own notes because he pushed his glasses back on his forehead, squinted and peered closely at what he had written. Nobody objected though; Tartakower was a legend and besides, it wasn't considered consulting written material in those days.  That would come many years later. 
     Bogoljubow's opponent in this game is A.H. Trott. Not a lot is available on Trott. He is referred to in an article in keverelchess.  He was an alumni of the Alleyn School in London. The June, 1947 issue of the school magazine mentions that he was playing for the school's chess team. The July, 1951 wrote, “A.H. Trott (tn 1945-47-note: this is apparently a reference to the years he attended) has won the Southern Counties' Chess Championship by finishing first out of the British players in the recent Southsea Tournament. Both The Times and the Observer made favourable comments on his play.” 
     This game where he was defeated by Bogoljubow has a rare finish. Trott's last move was a check and Bogoljubow replied with a move that delivered mate. 

The final standings of Southsea 1950 were: 
1-2) S. Tartakower and A. Bisguier 7.5 
3-5) J. Penrose, L. Schmid and H. Golombek 7.0 
6) E.D. Bogoljubow 6.5 
7-13) F.F.L. Alexander, L. Barden, R. Newman, L. Prins, A.R.B. Thomas, H. Trevense and R.G. Wade 6.0 
14-18) J.M. Aiken, B. Brown, L. Illingworth, R. Reifenberg and A.H. Trott 5.5 
19-25) H.H. Cole, L. Derby, J. Poole, K. Winterton, R.C. Woodthorpe, F.S. Wollford and R.F.G. Wright 5.0
26-31) W. Fry, A. Knight, I. Napier, J.J. O'Hanlon, P.A. Ursell and H.H. Wright 4.5 
32-35) Mrs. R.M. Bruce, J. Duthilleul, A. Eva and A. Warson 4.0 
36-38) Miss J. Doulton, Capt. H. Heneage and D. Leslie 3.5 
39-40) E. Attenborough and D. Fawcwtt 3.0 
41) Cmdr. J. Britton 2.0 
42) A.S. Dance 1.5