Maurice Raichenbach (born near

Warsaw Warsaw, officially the Capital City of Warsaw, is the capital and List of cities and towns in Poland, largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula, River Vistula in east-central Poland. Its population is officially estimated at ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

on May 12, 1915; died in

Hauts-de-Seine Hauts-de-Seine (; ) is a department in the Île-de-France region of France. It covers Paris's western inner suburbs. It is bordered by Paris, Seine-Saint-Denis and Val-de-Marne to the east, Val-d'Oise to the north, Yvelines to the west and ...

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

on March 1, 1998) was a Polish-born French

draughts Checkers (American English), also known as draughts (; Commonwealth English), is a group of strategy board games for two players which involve forward movements of uniform game pieces and mandatory captures by jumping over opponent pieces. ...

champion. His early childhood was spent in the area around Warsaw, but when he was a boy his mother died and his father moved them to France. He started at age 10 and at 14 was the champion of "Seine draughts club." At eighteen he became

Draughts World Championship The Draughts World Championship is the world championship in international draughts and is held every two years. In the even year following the tournament, the World Title match takes place. The men's championship began in 1885 in France and since ...

, which made him the youngest world champion at

International draughts International draughts (also called international checkers or Polish draughts) is a Abstract strategy, strategy board game for two players, one of the variants of draughts. The gameboard comprises 10×10 squares in alternating dark and light co ...

up to that point in history and one of the youngest ever. Hence he was sometimes referred to as "The Mozart of the Checkerboard."A biography from the Lyons Draughts group (In French)
/ref> He retained the title until 1938. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

he served the French army as a naturalized citizen. After France's defeat he went to the South of France and became a smuggler. His being Jewish was not known at this time and may have spared him a worse fate from the Nazis. After the war he retired from professional draughts at age thirty, although he still played "friendly" games for years afterward. His more lasting, if less notable, career was in the clothing business and at one time he had 200 employees. He died in 1998.

Bibliography

* Westerveld, Govert (2013). ''Biografía de Maurice Raichenbach, Campeón Mundial de las Damas entre 1933-1938''. Tomo I. (300 pages) * Westerveld, Govert (2013). ''Biografía de Maurice Raichenbach, Campeón Mundial de las Damas entre 1933-1938''. Tomo II. (357 pages)

References

External links

Image of Maurice Raichenbach
French draughts players 1915 births 1998 deaths Jewish French sportspeople Players of international draughts 20th-century Polish Jews French Army personnel of World War II Polish emigrants to France Smugglers French people of Polish-Jewish descent {{France-sport-bio-stub