Klaus Junge (1 January 1924 – 17 April 1945) was one of the youngest Chilean-German
chess
Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to dist ...
masters. In several tournaments during the 1940s he held his own among the world's leading players. An officer in the
Wehrmacht
The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the ''Heer'' (army), the '' Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmacht''" replaced the previo ...
, he died during the
Battle of Welle shortly before the end of
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
.
Biography
Junge was born into a
German Chilean
German Chileans ( es, germanochilenos; german: Deutsch-Chilenen) are Chileans descended from German immigrants, about 30,000 of whom arrived in Chile between 1846 and 1914. Most of these were from Bavaria, Baden and the Rhineland, and also from ...
family. His father
Otto
Otto is a masculine German given name and a surname. It originates as an Old High German short form (variants ''Audo'', '' Odo'', ''Udo'') of Germanic names beginning in ''aud-'', an element meaning "wealth, prosperity".
The name is recorded f ...
was a strong chess player who won the
Chilean Chess Championship in 1922. In 1928 his parents and their five sons returned to Germany.
On 11–20 August 1939, he, along with
Wolfgang Unzicker
Wolfgang Unzicker (26 June 1925 – 20 April 2006) was one of the strongest German chess Grandmasters from 1945 to about 1970.
He decided against making chess his profession, choosing law instead.
Unzicker was at times the world's strongest amat ...
(14 years old),
Edith Keller (17), Rudolf Kunath (15) and Karl Krbavic (17), played in Fürstenwalde (''Jugendschachwoche'') near Berlin.
In 1941, at the age of 17, Klaus Junge was considered one of the strongest players in Germany. In 1941, he won the championship of Hamburg. In May 1941, he won at Bad Elster (qualifying German championship). In August 1941, he tied for first with
Paul Felix Schmidt
Paul Felix Schmidt ( – 11 August 1984) was an Estonian and German chess player, writer and chemist.
Biography
In June 1935, Schmidt won, ahead of Paul Keres, at Tallinn. In May 1936, he drew a match against Keres (+3 –3 =1) at Pärnu. In 1 ...
at
Bad Oeynhausen
Bad Oeynhausen () is a spa town on the southern edge of the Wiehengebirge in the district of Minden-Lübbecke in the East-Westphalia-Lippe region of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. The closest larger towns are Bielefeld (39 kilometres southwest) ...
(the eighth
German Championship), although he lost a playoff match against Schmidt for the title at
Bromberg (+0 –3 =1). In October 1941, he took fourth place, behind
Alexander Alekhine
Alexander Aleksandrovich Alekhine, ''Aleksándr Aleksándrovich Alékhin''; (March 24, 1946) was a Russian and French chess player and the fourth World Chess Champion, a title he held for two reigns.
By the age of 22, Alekhine was already a ...
, Schmidt, and
Efim Bogoljubow
Efim Bogoljubow ( or ), also known as Ewfim Dimitrijewitsch Bogoljubow, ( (); also Romanized ''Bogoljubov'', ''Bogolyubov''; uk, Юхим Дмитрович Боголюбов, Yukhym Dmytrovych Boholiubov; April 14, 1889 – June 18, 1952) ...
, at Kraków/Warsaw (the second
General Government chess tournament General Government chess championships (''Schachmeisterschaft des Generalgouvernements'') were Nazi tournaments held during World War II in occupied central Poland. Hans Frank, the Governor-General of General Government, was the patron of those tour ...
championship).
In January 1942, Junge won the Dresden tournament. In 1942, he took second place, behind
Walter Niephaus
Walter Niephaus (March 30, 1923 – November 2, 1992, Andernach) was a German chess master.
Biography
Born in Mörs am Niederrhein (now Moers), he won Frankfurt City Championship in March 1942, won ahead of Fritz Sämisch and Ludwig Rellstab at ...
, at Leipzig. In April 1942, he was second, behind
Carl Carls
Carl Carls (September 16, 1880, Varel – September 11, 1958, Bremen) was a German chess master.
In 1922, he took 2nd, behind Erhardt Post, in Bad Oeynhausen (22nd DSB–Congress). He won the 2nd German Championships at Bad Aachen 1934.
He to ...
, at Rostock. In June 1942, he tied for third–fourth with Schmidt, behind Alekhine and
Paul Keres
Paul Keres (; 7 January 1916 – 5 June 1975) was an Estonian chess grandmaster and chess writer. He was among the world's top players from the mid-1930s to the mid-1960s, and narrowly missed a chance at a World Chess Championship match on five ...
, at the
Salzburg 1942 chess tournament The main organiser of Salzburg 1942, Ehrhardt Post, the Chief Executive of Nazi ''Grossdeutscher Schachbund'', intended to bring together the six strongest players of Germany, the occupied and neutral European countries; world champion Alexander Ale ...
. In September, he took seventh place at the Munich (the first
European Championship), won by Alekhine. In October 1942, he took second place, behind Alekhine, at Warsaw/Lublin/Kraków (the third General Government championship). In December 1942, he tied for first with Alekhine at Prague (
Duras Jubileé, ''60-jährigen Jubiläum''). In 1942–43, he played in three correspondence tournaments, beating among others
Rudolf Teschner and
Emil Joseph Diemer.
Klaus Junge, whose father had been a member of the
Nazi Party
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...
since 1932, was an adherent of the
National Socialist ideology
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...
. As a lieutenant of the
Wehrmacht
The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the ''Heer'' (army), the '' Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmacht''" replaced the previo ...
he died in combat against Allied troops on 17 April 1945 in the
Battle of Welle on the
Lüneburg Heath, close to Hamburg, three weeks before World War II ended.
In 1946, Regensburg hosted the first Klaus Junge Memorial. The event was won by
Fedor Bohatirchuk, ahead of
Elmārs Zemgalis
Elmārs Zemgalis (9 September 1923 – 8 December 2014) was a Latvian-American chess master and mathematics professor at Highline College. He was awarded an Honorary Grandmaster title in 2003.
Biography
Zemgalis started to play chess when he ...
, Wolfgang Unzicker, etc.
1946
Notable games
Kurt Richter vs Klaus Junge, Bad Oeynhausen 1941, GER-ch, Trompowsky Attack, A45, 0–1
Klaus Junge vs Paul Mross, Krakow 1941, Nimzo-Indian, Rubinstein Variation, E47, 1–0
Alexander Alekhine vs Klaus Junge, Salzburg 1942, Semi-Slav Defense, Marshall Gambit, D31, 0–1
Klaus Junge vs Čeněk Kottnauer, Prague 1942, Queen's Gambit Declined Semi-Slav, D46, 1–0
Klaus Junge vs Emil Josef Diemer, XVII.corr. tournament 1942–43, King's Gambit Accepted, C34, 1–0
Klaus Junge vs Walter Sahlmann, Hamburg 1944, Sicilian, Scheveningen Variation, B84, 1–0
Further reading
* Helmut Riedl: ''Das Leben und Schaffen von Klaus Junge''. Unterhaching 1995.
References
Notes
External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Junge, Klaus
1924 births
1945 deaths
German chess players
People from Concepción, Chile
Chilean emigrants to Germany
Chilean people of German descent
German Army officers of World War II
German military personnel killed in World War II
20th-century chess players
Reich Labour Service members