Čeněk Kottnauer

Cenek Kottnauer, English spelling of Czech first name Čeněk, ( born February 24, 1910 in Prague, † February 14, 1996 in London) was a Czech- British chess player.

Kottnauer played in 1942 and 1943 at the tournaments in Prague against the best chess master of his time. His first major international tournaments were Groningen in 1946 and the Chigorin Memorial tournament in Moscow in 1947. In 1950 he was awarded by the World Chess Federation FIDE the title of International Master. In 1951 he was also appointed to the International referee FIDE.

In 1952, he played for Czechoslovakia at the Chess Olympiad in Helsinki and achieved 12.5 out of 15 ( 83.33 %) excellent results, so he won the gold medal for best performance on the fourth board. In 1953, he won an international tournament in Lucerne.

In 1953 he emigrated to England and adopted British citizenship. He and his wife Daniela ( Horska born ) he lived in London. For England he joined the Chess Olympiads in 1964 in Tel Aviv ( 11.5 out of 18 on board 1) and in 1968 in Lugano ( 5.5 out of 12 on board 2 ). Later he taught in London many young talented chess players, some of which later became Chess Grandmaster Nigel Short, Dharshan Kumaran, Julian Hodgson, Stuart Conquest. In 1961, his son - Daniel Vincent Roy Kottnauer - to the world.