for a minimum of three years until the condition could be stabilised.

The business could not function successfully under this handicap, so Tim and Ros sold the Pasty Mine to a former employee and moved into a flat nearby.

After this, Tim gave up chess for almost a decade, but in 2008 they moved into Teignmouth and he started to get involved again in the local scene, re-joining the Teignmouth Club and playing in local congresses. He got involved in the chess element of the Twinning between Torbay and Hellevoetsluis in Holland, joining groups of players to visit the Dutch town and hosting them in return. In the summer of 2010 he arranged for a match between the two sides to be played at Forde House in Newton Abbot, thevery house in which William III stayed on his first night in England, having landed his troops at nearby Brixham, on his way from Hellevoetsluis to London to assume the British Crown. The Dutch appreciated the significance.

In December 2010, during a bitterly cold spell, he was returning to his house when he slipped and fell on some steep steps leading to his front door, fracturing his skull. He was taken to hospital but never recovered consciousness.

His memorial service was held at Torquay Crematorium on 4th February 2011, when chess colleagues joined with family members in celebrating Tim’s rich and varied life.

Rowena Mary Bruce (née Dew)

(15.05.1915 - 24.09.1999)

Rowena Bruce had perhaps the highest public profile of any British lady player in the middle decades of the 20th century, amassing