James Mortimer (chess player)

James Henry Gerard Mortimer[1] (22 April 1832[2] – 24 February 1911) was an American-born British chess player, journalist, and playwright.

When American chess champion Paul Morphy traveled to Paris in 1858, Mortimer met him and they became friends.

After he was convicted by the jury Mortimer was able to produce evidence to the judges that he had no personal knowledge of the libelous article, but it was too late.

In the London tournament of 1883, he beat Johannes Zukertort and Mikhail Chigorin, but finished tied for last in a field of 14 with a score of 3–23.

At the BCA International Congress in London in 1886 he defeated Jean Taubenhaus, James Mason, William H. K. Pollock, and Emil Schallopp, but finished with a score of 4–8 and in 11th place of 13.

When he was 74 he played the 1907 Masters Tournament at Ostend and defeated Savielly Tartakower, Eugene Znosko-Borovsky, and Joseph Henry Blackburne, but finished last of 29 with a score of 5–23.

The greatest excitement prevailed, and an arrangement was made by which the game was kept on three boards at the Café de la Régence (only a few blocks distant), a domestic carrying the moves every half hour.