Newcastle City Library will next month host a memorial tournament for the North East’s most famous chess player, Grandmaster Jonathan Hawkins of Consett, who passed away in December after a battle with cancer. He was 42.
The memorial rapidplay will take place on Saturday April 11, from 10:30am to 1:30pm, in the library’s Bewick Hall. Entry is free, and participants are encouraged to donate to Cancer Research UK.
To enter, email: timpeterwall@gmail.com or WhatsApp: 0750 372 2366, giving your full name and date of birth. The tournament has spaces for up to 60 participants, so players are advised to enter early.
The FIDE- and ECF-rated event will be a six-round Open Swiss, with trophies for Open, Under 1800, Under1500, and Juniors (Under 18) categories.
After the tournament, a reception with light refreshments is planned.
Hawkins was unique among North East players, winning the British Championship twice, in 2014 and 2015. Among modern-day grandmasters Hawkins’ route to the top was unusual. Rather than being a child prodigy with a personal coach, he was purely self-taught and only emerged as a strong player in his twenties.
Hawkins played as a junior at Consett Chess Club, later switching to playing for Leam Lane in the Northumbria League, where he built a formidable reputation. He achieved the International Master title in 2010 at 27, and the Grandmaster title in 2014 at 31.
Many of the players in the memorial event will be friends, teammates and students of Hawkins, who was over the last decade mostly involved in the game as a coach of leading juniors.
Among Hawkins’ students were IM Sohum Lohia, currently England’s second-highest rated junior, FIDE Master Stanley Badacsonyi and Zain Patel, another promising junior from London.
Apart from Hawkins’ games, which typically showed a fine blend of tactics and strategy, his legacy includes one of the best books on practical endgame play ever written. Published in 2012, Hawkins’ “Amateur to IM: Proven Ideas and Training Methods” explains how endgame practice and study helped him become a strong player.
After the 2012 British Championships in North Shields, where Hawkins met his future wife, chess coach Angela Eyton, Hawkins moved to London and they set up a successful chess coaching business together. In recent years they had relocated to Torbay, Devon. Last year Hawkins was diagnosed with a rare and aggressive form of cancer, and he died in Torbay on December 22. Apart from Angela, Hawkins is survived by his parents and two brothers.
This week’s puzzles show brilliant finishes by Hawkins at his very best.
(source Chess with Knight, Newcastle Chronicle Friday March 20,2026)
Answers:
A: 1…Bh3+! 0-1. If 2 Kxh3 (2 Kf2 Qf1 mate) 2…Qf1+ 3 Kg4 h5+ 4 Kh4 g5+ 5 Kxh5 Qh3 mate.
B: 1 Rg4+! 1-0. If 1…fxg4 2 Qxg4+ Bg5 3 Qxg5+ Rg7 4 Qxg7 mate.
C: 1…Ng1+! 0-1. If 2 Rxg1 Qxf2 mate, or 2 Ke1 Rxd3 3 Qc2 Rxe3+! 4 Kd2 Rd8+ 5 Kxe3 Qf3 mate.
D: 1 g6! fxg6 2 Bxe6+ 1-0.
