From Denmark with Love

The From Gambit (1.f4 e5!?) is named for Martin Janus Severin From (1828-95) of Denmark, one of its early advocates. I have played it many times with great success, mostly in blitz games but also in my shortest-ever tournament win (1.f4 e5 2.fxe5 d6 3.exd6 Bxd6 4.Nf3 g5 5.h3?? Bg3# Napetschnig (1722)-Rhine, Gompers Park Fall Championship 1977). It often leads to sparkling play, as in this brilliancy, won by the great Carl Schlechter. Schlechter drew a match for the world championship against Lasker in 1910, and edited what David Hooper and Kenneth Whyld call "the eighth, last, and best edition of Bilguer's Handbuch (1912-16), a classic of more than 1,000 large pages." Tragically, he died of pneumonia and starvation at the end of World War I.

A Magnificent Trap in the Trompowsky

The Anglo-Swiss GM Joe Gallagher pulled off the elegant trap given below against the Trompowsky Attack (1.d4 Nf6 2.Bg5). All of White's moves are very plausible. Best may have been the retrograde 5.Bc1!?, arguing that the queen doesn't really do much on b6, and intending to drive back Black's knight with f3 and e4. White played 7.Bxb8 because he was worried about 7.cxd4 Nc6 8.Nf3 Nb4. After 7...dxc3!, 8.Be5?? seemed to hold everything, but Gallagher's glorious 8...Rxa2!! annihilated White. On 9.Rxa2, 9...c2! would threaten both 10...cxb1(Q)# and 10...c1(Q)#.

Chessgames.com says that the game ended after 8...Rxa2!!, but Gallagher says that White unsportingly played on, even though it is difficult to hold his losses to "only" a rook and knight. This game is reminiscent of the famous Schlechter-Perlis game, except that in that game Black avoided the worst with 8...Nxc6!, leaving him just a pawn down.