by Tim Harding, 439pp. softcover (7 x 10) McFarland, 2010
53 photos, tables, appendices, notes, bibliography, indexes 
 

Exploring a bygone aspect of intellectual sport, this book details the history of British and Irish correspondence chess from the first formal match between Edinburgh and London in 1824 well into the 1980s, the most successful period in British correspondence chess. It traces the development of postal chess, including the growth of regional and national chess associations after World War I; the dawn of game-changing technologies such as the telegraph, the telephone, radio, and fax machines; the earliest transatlantic matches between the U.S. and the U.K.; the founding of the International Correspondence Chess Association in 1945; and the breaking of the Soviet monopoly on the world team championship in 1982 (the final act of the joint Great Britain team before Scotland and Wales obtained separate membership in the International Correspondence Chess Federation). Appendices list tournament champions; I.C.C.F. title holders; known club matches; and interesting excerpts from rules and other documents. Extensive notes, bibliography and indexes.

 

1. Capital Letters: Edinburgh versus London, 1824–1828
2. Heyday of the Inter-Club Matches
3. Penny Post and Private Matches
4. Moves Over the Wires: Chess Adopts Technology

5. The Earliest Postal Tournaments, 1853 to 1870
6. Changing Times: The 1870s and 1880s
7. “A Battle at Long Range”: The United Kingdom versus the United States, 1877–1881
8. The Growth of Tournaments, 1870 to 1897
9. Scottish Correspondence Chess to 1918
10. Irish and Welsh Correspondence Chess to 1918
11. The English Scene, 1890 to 1918
12. From One War to the Next, 1918 to 1939
13. Correspondence Chess During World War II
14. International Revival, 1946 to 1951
15. Domestic Competitions, 1946 to 1970
16. Crisis and Resolution: Britain and the International Correspondence Chess Federation, 1951 to 1971
17. The Home Front: The 1970s and 1980s
18. Growth and Success, 1972 to 1982
19. Becoming World Champions

 

Tim Harding (Ph.D., University of Dublin, 2009) is a Senior International Master of correspondence chess, and played on the Irish team at the 1984 FIDE Chess Olympiad in Thessaloniki, Greece. He lives in Dublin and writes for ChessCafe.com.