When the World Wars Interrupted Major Tournaments
INTRODUCTION
Much of the 20th century was filled with global conflict that affected countless activities and lives. Even our great game of chess could not escape the devastation of the two World Wars. Major chess tournaments were interrupted and play took a pause, altering the career path of many players and changing the course of chess history itself in many ways. In this blog, I present two significant chess tournaments that were directly disrupted by the World Wars and, as a result, left a lasting impact on the game of chess.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
- MANNHEIM 1914: FROM TOURNAMENT TO INTERNMENT
- Tournament Details
- Interference by WWI
- Aftermath and Effect - 8TH CHESS OLYMPIAD: THE OLYMPIAD THAT SAVED LIVES
- Tournament Details
- Interference by WWII
- Aftermath and Effect - CONCLUSION
MANNHEIM 1914: FROM TOURNAMENT TO INTERNMENT
The 1914 chess tournament in Mannheim, Germany, was the 19th tournament of the recurring international tournament series called the DSB Congress. The 1914 Mannheim tournament contained a main section and a Masters section. The Masters section featured eighteen players and many familiar names, including Alexander Alekhine of Russia, Frank Marshall of the US, and Savielly Tartakower of Austria-Hungary. It was structured as a single round-robin, meaning each player would play seventeen games.
The tournament began on July 20, 1914. There were certainly some political tensions at the beginning of the tournament, but nothing extreme enough to cause concern about whether or not the event should even take place. However, with each passing round, tensions grew and the political situation worsened. The safety of Germany dwindled. There was a somber feeling among the masters participating in the tournament in Mannheim. On August 1, 1914, Germany declared war on Russia. Round eleven of the tournament had just finished. It was clear that the tournament could not go on in the midst of a war outbreak, so the tournament had to be discontinued.
Through eleven rounds, Alexander Alekhine led the event with nine wins, one loss, and one draw, totaling 9.5 points. Because the tournament was not fully completed, only part of the prize money was distributed to the top finishers based on the results after round eleven.
(Courtesy of chessgames.com)
After the start of the war, numerous players from the Russian Empire who had participated in the Mannheim tournament, namely Alekhine, Janowski, and Flamberg, were placed into internment camps in Germany by the German army under wartime laws. Alekhine detailed the harsh prison mistreatment in a later interview:
They sent us to a military prison where we were held for more than twenty-four hours. Here the soldiers cursed us terribly. They said that we were dangerous Russian spies, and that at any moment an order was expected that we were to be shot. Later, however, we were told that we were free from suspicion of espionage and they sent us to a civilian prison. We sat there for about two weeks. All of our things were taken away from us. The treatment was horrible. They fed us worse than what is fed to dogs.
- Alexander Alekhine, Mannheim 1914 and the Interned Russians by Anthony Gillam
Several of the interned players continued playing chess while imprisoned. The internees organized a series of eight tournaments called the Triberg tournaments that took place from 1914 to 1917 in a German town called Triberg im Schwarzwald. These tournaments proved important in helping some of the interned masters remain competitive.
Many of the interned masters were allowed to return to their homes and normal lives within a couple of years of imprisonment, while others remained in Triberg for the rest of the war before being freed. Amazingly, just about every imprisoned master was ultimately able to resume their lives as normal after the war. One master whose life was altered by the war was Efim Bogoljubov, who had emerged as a star during the Triberg tournaments, having won many of them. Bogoljubov stayed in Germany after the war and eventually settled permanently there, even representing Germany in future tournaments.
As for the players' chess fates, some emerged from the pause in international tournament play during the war stronger, like Alekhine, who won his first World Chess Championship a decade later, while others lost precious years of competition and faded from prominence.
The 1914 tournament in Mannheim maintains a mysterious legacy as "the unfinished tournament." The ramifications of its sudden stop due to World War I were greatly felt in the years following.
8TH CHESS OLYMPIAD: THE OLYMPIAD THAT SAVED LIVES
The 8th Chess Olympiad was held in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in the year 1939. Twenty-seven national teams were set to participate in the tournament, totaling 133 players, making it by far the largest Olympiad yet. The teams were divided into four round-robin groups, with three groups of seven teams and one group of six. The top four teams from each group advanced to Final Group A, while the other teams competed in Final Group B. The big names in the tournament included the reigning World Champion Alekhine, representing France, José Raul Capablanca, representing Cuba, and Paul Keres, representing Estonia.
Similar to the 1914 Mannheim tournament, there were some early changes to the Olympiad due to political tensions. Max Euwe announced that he would not play for the Netherlands and withdrew from the tournament, a huge loss for the Dutch team. Several players were representing new countries for geopolitical reasons, such as Austrian masters Erich Eliskases and Albert Becker, who played for Germany. Some teams also decided not to make the trip to Argentina for travel reasons and out of concern for the uncertain political situations, including the United States and Hungary.
Despite the starting troubles, the tournament went on. The preliminary rounds were played from August 21-31, 1939. Fear of a global war rose as the days went by. The final rounds were set to begin on September 1. That same day, Germany invaded Poland, signaling the start of World War II. The players weren't sure whether or not the Olympiad could continue, especially considering many of them were representing countries involved in the war, though most players wanted to keep playing. The only team that firmly did not want to continue playing was Team England, which had qualified for the Finals but shockingly decided to completely withdraw from the tournament and return home to Europe to help the British army with code-breaking in the war.
All the chaos led to an assembly of team captains and organizers being held, where it was determined that the Olympiad would go on, but because of the political issues, some teams (specifically the ones that had declared war) could not play each other and would be forced to draw certain matches 2-2 by agreed forfeit, such as Germany, France, and Poland.
The plan to proceed was confusing, and the rest of the tournament was a bit turbulent, but in the end, the Olympiad was astonishingly able to be played to a full conclusion. Team Germany took home the gold medal, with silver going to Poland and bronze to Estonia.
(Courtesy of Olimpbase.org)
Following the tournament, many of the players decided to remain in South America and not return home to Europe to avoid the war. So, in a way, the tournament became a refuge for those who participated and chose to stay put.
Some players who stayed, namely Miguel Najdorf and the entire German team, went on to permanently reside in Argentina and represent the country in later tournaments. Argentine chess thrived in much of the post-WWII era, and they became key leaders, significantly boosting the power of the Argentine team.
The 8th Olympiad was the last Olympiad for more than a decade. The 9th Olympiad was held in 1950 and was a lot smaller in size due to the ongoing recovery from the war.
Overall, although the 8th Olympiad itself was messy, the aftermath was greatly beneficial. The legacy of the tournament endures for having spared numerous players from much of the war's destruction and creating a new chess powerhouse in Argentina.
The World Wars' disturbance of these tournaments marked significant turning points in chess history. These events altered many aspects of the chess world and left consequences that can still be observed today. Additionally, they show not only the extent of the turmoil caused by the World Wars, reaching even our game of chess, but also the resilience of our game, remaining strong through the dramatic and lengthy play stops caused by the wars.
These two tournaments are iconic, and I found the topic fascinating enough to explore them in-depth. I trust you learned something, share in the comments!
I hope you enjoyed this blog. Cya next time! 
