The last rule about pawns is called “en passant,” which is French basically means “in passing”. If a pawn moves out two squares on its first move, and by doing so lands to the side of an opponent’s pawn (effectively jumping past the other pawn’s ability to capture it), that other pawn has the option of capturing the first pawn as it passes by. This special move must be done immediately after the first pawn has moved past, otherwise the option to capture it is no longer available.
http://www.chess.com/article/view/chess-rules--basicsstrange pawn moves
Sort:
En Passant
So if someone moves their pawn two places, so that it is alongside my pawn, I can say en passant, remove his pawn from the board and then take my normal move?
Not exactly. You need to make your diagonal move. If a pawn has moved two squares, just look at it and think about whether you could have taken it if it had moved only one square. If you could have, it means you can take it now, even though it went two squares. But you have to act like the opponent's pawn went just one square. And remember that you cannot wait. If the other pawn went two squares, you do a move other than en passant and decide to do it later, it's not allowed. Hope this helps.
Watch this.
The light has gone on over my head! Many thanks for helping me understand this strange rule.
Apart from "Castling" (swapping King and Rook over which I do understand) and en passant, are there any other strange rules which allow pieces to move in odd ways in certain situations?
Thanks again
Just the various rules behind castling.
1. can't castle out of check (or into of course)
2. can't castle through check.
3. Once the king has moved, castling is no longer an option.
4. And the obvious, can't castle with any pieces between king and rook. The only place this may not be so obvious is on the queen side.
Watch this. @ xbigboy
after 2nd move .Qh5 is mate 
I am an infrequent chess player. This evening I am playing someone and I made a sacrifical move moving my pawn one space forward which left it one square diagonally in front of my opponents pawn. In stead of taking it he moved one space directly in front (the space next to my pawn). I understand that he has the option not to take my piece by moving another piece somewheer else but I was taught that if you can take a piece with a pawn you have to take that piece in a diagonal move and cannot move one square forward as per normal. Will someone please resolve this issue.
Many thanks
gwfisher wrote:
I am an infrequent chess player. This evening I am playing someone and I made a sacrifical move moving my pawn one space forward which left it one square diagonally in front of my opponents pawn. In stead of taking it he moved one space directly in front (the space next to my pawn). I understand that he has the option not to take my piece by moving another piece somewheer else but I was taught that if you can take a piece with a pawn you have to take that piece in a diagonal move and cannot move one square forward as per normal. Will someone please resolve this issue.
Many thanks
This is not correct. Pawns are not forced to capture.
Here is a common opening as an example:
Are you thinking of Draughts (Checkers).
When I learnt to play I was taught but don't know if it is correct) that when an opponent was able to capture a man but didn't you hd three options:
1). force them to make a capturing move insead of the one they did
2). let theirmove stand
3). "huff" them for not taking you - simply remove the/a piece that could have captured, but didn't from the board (this doesn't count as your move).
In chess it is not compulsory in and of itself to capture a pawn just because you can (though positions could arise where that wasthe only legal move).
I believe there are some chess variants where captures are mandatory if possible - but I can't think of one where that only applies to the pawns.
Many thanks for clearing that up.
can anyone tell me whether this is legal. its not en passant. its some weird pawn move. is there any other chess rule i m unaware of. [Event "Computer"] [Site " Chess.com"] [Date "07-Oct-2017"] [White "khushmonster"] [Black "Comp"] [Result "*"] [SetUp "1"] [FEN "rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1"] 1. e4 e5 2. Be2 Bc5 3. a3 Ne7 4. g4 O-O 5. hxg3 * Sent from my Android
Khushmonster, I checked your game in the game editor and if those are the moves its NOT a legal move.
to find the game editor, in top of page (in v2) go to "more"
Khushmonster I actually have a game in progress with a similar illegal move made by computer. I landed on this thread looking for an obscure pawn rule as well.
[Event "Computer"] [Site " Chess.com"] [Date "Dec 28, 2017"] [White "Comp"] [Black "johnnyreina"] [Result "*"] [SetUp "1"] [FEN "rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1"] 1. d4 d5 2. c4 Nf6 3. Nc3 c6 4. b3 Nbd7 5. Bf4 e5 6. Bg5 h6 7. Bc1 exd4 8. Nb1 Ne5 9. Nf3 Qe7 10. Nxe5 Qxe5 11. Bd2 Be7 12. h4 O-O 13. gxh3 *
I have a little query:
I think it's called something like en passant. It's where a pawn take another piece by moving 2 moves forward, taking it past the piece, then going diagonal and the piece is taken. Soemthing like that anyway.
How does it work and what's the proper name?
Many thanks for any advice (relating to this topic).