History

Chris Ravilious who is a county archivist and writes a monthly column in "Chess" has written to chairman Simon Deere (5/8/2002) with the following notes regarding the early history of the club.

As early as 1890 the Parish Room Club in Crowborough had facilities for playing chess, though not a formal chess section. In the course of his researches Brian Denman found evidence of a local 'chess group' in 1896-1898, though it seems to have been short-lived.

The Crowborough CC, as such, was formed in 1925 with a simultaneous display given by  F.D. Yates at Warren Wood, the home of the Hon. F.G. Hamilton-Russell (this was mentioned in the chess column of the Times Literary Supplement). He became the club's president and later took on the same role at the BCF.

From at least the beginning of 1927 (possibly earlier) its activities were reported regularly in the Country Edition of the Sussex County Herald, our main source of information on the club. At first it met weekly at Mockett's Cafe, but later it moved to the Broadway Cafe and then the Constitutional Club. Most of its external links were with clubs in Kent, notably Tunbridge Wells and Sevenoaks: it also played a regular annual match against the Crowborough Beacon Golf Club. Many match scores are reported in detail in the paper, as are several AGMs.

I haven't worked exhaustively through the Sussex County Herald for the whole of the inter-war period, but there are certainly reports on the club up to 1938. The last I have at present is a report of a match played against Southborough in March 1938 (and lost by 1.5 to 8.5 points!). Most probably the club came to an end in the first year or so of the war, but I have no direct evidence of this.

Overall the Crowborough CC seems to have had a somewhat unexciting existence, and didn't attract or discover any very notable players.