- James Alexander Porterfield Rynd
James Alexander Porterfield Rynd (1846 -1917) was Dublin born chess player and lawyer.
He was born on April 6th, 1846 the son of Dublin solicitor James Goodlatte Rynd.King’s Inn’s Barristers, 1868-2004, edited by Kenneth Ferguson, 2005]
He won the
Irish Chess Championship competition in 1865 was run under the auspices of the "Hibernia Chess Association" a forerunner of theIrish Chess Union . This Tournament was run alongside an international chess tournament in Dublin. [ [http://www.icu.ie/articles/display.php?id=76 Porterfield Rynd 1846-1917] by David McAlister and Richard Forster (June 2000)]Porterfield Rynds birth date is often listed incorrectly as 1855 this has led some books to cast doubt on his claim to the Irish championship in 1865, such as "The Guinness Book of Chess Records" by Ken Whyld [Page 103, The Guinness Book of Chess Records by Ken Whyld Guinness 1986] . But further articles and his obituaries discount this and state he was born in 1846 and died aged 71 in 1917 [Obituary J.A. Porterfield Rynd, Irish Times, Monday 19th March 1917] .
He was accepted as the Irish Chess Champion until 1885 when a tournament was hosted by the "Irish Chess Association] to find an Irish Champion, Rynd did not play in this tournament. Rynd won the title again in 1892.Porterfield Rynd held an LLB, in 1869 he entered the [King's Inns] , Dublin, and was called to the Bar in 1874. On 7 September 1869 he married Anna Cranwill and on 9 October 1873 his first child was born: Kenneth Arly Rynd. [ [http://www.chesscafe.com/text/kibitz121.pdf The Last Homecoming of Mars] The Kibitzer by Tim Harding 2006]
"Easily the most colorful personage in the place was Porterfield Rynd, one of the ablest members of the Dublin bar--a man who, if he had been half as devoted to the drudgery of work as he was to the allurement of play, could easily have attained the highest honors in the judiciary." [ [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=59326409 CHAPTER FIVE "Congress v. House of Commons at Chess"] , Silent Years: An Autobiography with Memoirs of
James Joyce and Our Ireland. Contributors: J. F. Byrne - author. Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Young. Place of Publication: New York. Publication Year: 1953. Page Number: 48. ]He was a member of
Clontarf Tennis and Chess Club, and played many sports in his youth. Rynd was a member of Dublin Chess Club and played in the first ever Armstrong Cup, the oldest irish league competiton.Porterfield Rynd was a
Unionist and produced pamphlet of his thoughts on the subject in 1906 for theIrish Unionist Association . [Irish Unionist policy: Being the " Declaration of policy " tendered, and the speech thereon delivered in Dublin on the 19th October, 1906, at the opening ... of the Dublin Parliamentary Debating Society by J. A. Porterfield Rynd (1906)]A letter of Rynds outlining support for the unionist cause are contained in letters to
Bonar Law [ [http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/A2A/records.aspx?cat=061-bl_1&cid=-1&Gsm=2008-06-18 "Evidence of sympathy of the British working man to the Ulster opposition to Home Rule" from J.A. Porterfield Rynd] , Grosvenor Hotel, Manchester. BL/26/5/44 28 July 1912]In the 1890's Porterfield Rynd edited a chess column which regularly appeared on the back page of the Saturday issue of Dublin's
Evening Herald . [ [http://www.gadycosteff.com/eg/eg143.pdf#page=31 "The Porterfield Rynd Affair"] by J. Roycroft January 2002] He was not burdened with modesty and the title "Irish Champion" appears beside his column.He died in Dublin on the 17th of March 1917, his obituary was in the Irish Times of Monday 19th March 1917, "RYND - March 17, 1917 JAMES ALEXANDER PORTERFIELD RYND, Barrister-at-Law, in his 71st year", and there was also an obituary in the Belfast Newsletter 22nd of March 1917.
References
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