Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Picking Up & Losing A Historical Thread (Part 1)

Several years ago see "The Joy of Discovery (Part I)" – I encountered the following Jerome Gambit game

Harris,W.A. Sgt. - Quayle,Ernest H.
Los Angeles, California, USA 1944

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ Kxf7 5.Nxe5+ Nxe5 6.Qh5+ g6 7.Qxe5 d6 8.Qxh8 Qh4 9.0-0 Nf6 10.Qd8 Bd7 11.Qxc7 Bb6 12.g3 Qh3 13.Qxd6 Bc6 14.g4 Qxg4+ White resigned

It had appeared see "The Joy of Discovery (Part II)" in Herman Steiner's "Chess" column in the Los Angeles Times for January 7, 1945, with the note "A short game by Ladderite E. H. Quayle of Westwood, Cal., and Sgt. W. A. Harris of Brownsville, Tx."

Of the latter player, I wrote

1944 was war time, and Fort Brown in Brownsville, Texas was where the 124th Cavalry Regiment was stationed. The 124th remained a mounted unit until its deployment in the China-Burma-India theater of operations.
That was as far as I was able to trace the early Jerome Gambiteer see "The Joy of Discovery (Part III)".

Recently, however, I discovered (in the "Bryant College Goes to War" collection) a couple of V-mails, one written in 1944 and one written in 1945, by a Sgt. Winston A. Harris.

Could he be the same chess player?



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