A Suicidal Sacrifice

The year is 1909. A 40-year-old Emanuel Lasker was World Champion after defeating Tarrasch the year prior and a 28-year-old Akiba Rubinstein was on the rise. The first Norwegian GM, Olaf Barda, was born in this year. This was also the year a German chess master, mysteriously took his own life by poisoning himself and shooting himself dead.

This is the story of Rudolf Swiderski, his chess accomplishments, and his mysterious death.

His Personal Life

Born on the 28th of July, 1978, Rudolf Swiderski was the son of the manufacturer Philipp Swiderski. He was born in the German City of Leipzig. Along with chess, Rudolf studied Music. He was a good violinist.

Rudolf Swiderski

Sadly, not much else is known about Swiderski's personal life. He studied at his city's Royal High School and was a very quiet person according to many people who had met him.

Chess Career

He started playing competitive chess around the year 1896. His first well-known chess achievement was when he won the Munich Hauptturnier in 1900.

Results from 1900.

Swiderski’s best year was 1904, when he achieved his peak rating of 2629. He also won many tournaments, including the German Chess Championship of 1904 and the Rice Gambit tournament of 1904. Swiderski had beaten many great players of his time including Akiba Rubinstein and Henry Blackbrune.

Playing Style

Swiderski’s games were known for having a ton of sacrifices, king walks and his defense was extremely sharp. With his great defense capabilities, Swiderski also knew how to switch over to an attack at the correct time as well.

One of his favorite openings was the French defense and Swiderski liked playing hypermodern openings before famous players like Nimzowitsch did so. Swiderski is sometimes called "Nimzowitsch before Nimzowitsch", but only if he is ever called. Swiderski is a pretty obscure chess master, but he deserves more recognition than what he has...

A Quirky Game of Swiderski's:

A complex game, which Swiderski should have lost. There are enough sparkling moves in this game to earn two brilliancy prizes, one for white and one for black. 

German Chess Championship 1904

Till the 1920s, Germany was the Soviet Union of Chess. All the best players were from Germany or Austria-Hungary and no one could get close to their levels. 

Carl Schlechter was the favorite to win this tournament, but he lost badly to Swiderski in an early round. Our protagonist kept having his ups and downs during this tournament. Every time he did well, he would beat himself up in the next round and lose again. He started a point behind first place and then became first placed later in the tournament. Without two games remaining in the tournament, Swiderski could just win one of them and win the tournament. Due to the pressure, he lost to his opponent and tied for first place with two other masters.

SWIDERSKI'S FINAL GAME (in the 1904 championship):

White's pieces have much more space and will slowly but surely crush Black's position. White's pawns will march up the board and the pieces will protect them.

Barmen Tournament 1905

Swiderski did pretty well in this tournament, but in some games, he collapsed as much as he had at the Munich Tournament the year prior. Swiderski was a very nervous person and would sometimes lose games because he didn't want to take a draw. He ended this tournament with 2nd place, on 12/17.

Swiderski's pieces are much better and he is also a pawn up. White's pawns are also very weak and can be easily targeted.

Aron Nimzowitsch, a famous chess player that you've probably heard of, played in this tournament and scored 6/17. He would go on to become one of the best and most important players of the late 1920s. As stated earlier, Swiderski was probably one of Nimzo's inspirations.

Rice Gambit (Monte Carlo 1904)

In the Rice Gambit Thematic Tournament of the Monte Carlo series, Swiderski won along with Frank Marshall. Swiderski was very good at these eccentric openings. 

The Rice Gambit was an opening made by Isaac Sn- I mean Isaac Rice. It's a variation of the King's Gambit which goes:

(1. e4 e5 2. f4 exf4 3. Nf3 g5 4. h4 g4 5. Ne5 Nf6 6. Bc4 d5 7. exd5 Bd6 8. 0-0). The opening is usually considered a joke, but it is definitely more playable than it's made seem.

Ostend Tournament

This tournament was divided into two sections - Championship and Masters. The Championship tournament had players like Frank Marshall, Schlechter and Tarrasch. The Masters tournament had a lot of famous players in it, including Akiba Rubinstein, Jacques Mieses, Aron Nimzowitsch, Savielly Tartakower, Oldrich Duras, Henry Blackburne and, of course, Rudolf Swiderski. 

At this point in time, Tartakower and Nimzo were not even 20 years old, being 17 and 18 respectively. This tournament took place at Ostend, Belgium.

Swiderski didn't do extremely well in this tournament, but he was able to convincingly beat Akiba Rubinstein in the 19th round!

And White is lost. Checkmate is actually forced unless White gives up his Queen for Black's rook, but that is still lost. 

Vienna 1908

This was a 20-player tournament held from March 23 to April 17, 1908. 

Aaaand Black is lost. After the dust is settled, White will be a up a bishop.

This tournament was embraced by some of the greatest chess minds of the time, including Géza Maróczy, Carl Schlechter, Oldrich Duras, Akiba Rubinstein, Rudolf Spielmann, Savielly Tartakower and Curt von Bardeleben. Swiderski also played in this tournament but he didn't do very well - 8 wins and 8 losses.

Death

On July 30, 1909, Swiderski participated in his final tournament in a Leipzig club competition. He won the tournament, but he passed away soon after, making it impossible for him to collect the award. August 2 was the last day when life was observed. He ended his own life either that day or a little later. It is said that he drank poison and shot himself. 

Credit to Edward Winter

But what was the reason for his death? We’ll never know for certain. There are many sources which state different reasons for why...

REASON 1: Rudolf had a severe illness and also had some sort of mental derangement. He didn’t want to suffer with the necessary operation, so he killed himself.

If he had a severe illness, how would he have played a chess game less than a week prior to his death? Unless it was something like AIDS, Cancer or a Heart disease, I don’t think that this is the actual reason for his suicide.

REASON 2:  Swiderski was recently convicted of perjury in a trial that involved him in a disgraceful scandal.

This one might be the real reason as it's the one stated in most articles about Swiderski. Most say that his scandal was something to do with a love affair and some say it was because he committed a criminal act.

Credit to Edward Winter

FRANK MARSHALL ON SWIDERSKI

Swiderski was a peculiar fellow. He made very few friends, had a gentle but melancholy disposition, was a fine violinist, ate raw meat, and committed suicide a few years later.

- Frank Marshall

Of all the chess masters I ever met, R. Swiderski of Germany was the most weird

- Frank Marshall

WEIRD FACTS

- Swiderski is not the only German great of his time to die of suicide. Van Bardeleben, a person who tied with Swiderski in the 1904 German championship, also died because he “accidently” committed suicide by falling off the balcony. Bardeleben was one of Germany's best players in the 1890s. 

Other chess players who committed suicide are:

• Alvis Vitolinš: Alvis Vītoliņš was a Latvian IM. He committed suicide by jumping onto the frozen ice of the Gauja River from a railway bridge in 1997.
• Lembit Oll: Lembit Oll was an Estonian chess grandmaster. Oll went into a state of depression after his wife divorced him, and so he suicided by jumping out of his
• Alexander Wittek: Alexander Wittek was an Austrian architect and chess player. It's not a fact that he committed suicide, with some saying he died from Tuberculosis and some saying he died in a mental asylum, but I'm adding him to the list.
• Josef Cukierman: Cukierman (more like Cookieman) was a French cheass master who was born in Poland. He committed suicide during WW2.
• Dmitry Svetushkin: Dmitry Svetushkin was a Russian Chess Grandmaster who actually ended his life relatively recently (in 2020).
• Karen Ashotovich Grigorian: Grigorian and Vitolins (the first player on this list) were both good friends and excellent players but they both had mental health issues. Grigorian jumped from a very high bridge in Yerevan, Armenia to end his life,
• Norman van Lennep: As far as I know, Norman is the youngest chess player to have committed suicide. He was a Dutch Chess Master and died by jumping off a ship into the North Sea.

- Another weird detail is that Swiderski's exact birth date is not known. Some articles say he was born on the 28th of July, some say the 28th of August.

- You might know about the Maróczy Bind pawn structure in chess.

The Bind structure is named after the famous Hungarian chess player, Geza Maróczy. So you might think he was the first person to play it or analyze it in depth. But in reality, Rudolf Swiderski was the first person to play it AGAINST Maróczy! Maróczy was the "bindee" rather than the "binder"!

Ever since then, the Maróczy bind has been analyzed for Black and now it's not considered very dangerous.

- Swiderski almost had more losses than wins. Swiderski always liked to push for a win even in positions which are drawn, which would lead him to lose a lot of them.

Puzzles From His Games

PUZZLE 2:

This puzzle is from Swiderski's game against A Petterson in 1905. The match took place in the same Barmen tournament of 1905, which I already talked about earlier in the blog.

Horatio Caro was an English chess player. He is well-known for his contributions to the Caro-Kann defense along with Marcus Kann. He made his mark by beating Emanuel Lasker (1890) in just fourteen moves.

PUZZLE 3:

This puzzle is from the Ostend 1907 tournament, where Swiderski defeated Franz G. Jacob.

Franz G. Jacob was a German chess player, born in modern-day France. He sadly never did well in any tournaments and sort of quit chess.

PUZZLE 4

White starts with an exchange sacrifice and forces Black to take. If Black were to not take and play Kh7, White would win immediately with Rg1g7#. After Black takes back, White captures the defenseless Black knight and forces Black to move again. The only move which doesnt look like it loses on the spot is Kh7, so Black plays it. And then White performs an amazing Queen sacrifice to seal the deal. 

This puzzle was also from the Barmen 1905 Tournament. Swiderski beat Wilhelm Schwan, a German chess player, to win this game. 

Swiderski could've made a  substantial impact on chess in his later years, but he sadly killed himself. He ended himself at the age of 31, just like how I'm going to end this blog now. 

Thanks for reading, have a good day.

Damn, Swiderski must have had some hard situations to have killed himself. But you know what's not hard? Filling out this form: https://forms.gle/YvNHWNuhrodVdFCdA. It only takes 30 seconds and your name can be etched into chess.com's history.

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