DSB Congress XX Hauptturnier I, Berlin 1920

◇One of four independent Hauptturniere

The first DSB congress since the First World War held four equal-status Hauptturniere instead of a Meisterturnier. Their participants were allocated among separate fields, and each winner could earn the federation’s master title. The Berliner Tageblatt sponsored Hauptturnier I. The other Hauptturniere were parallel competitions, not qualifying or final stages of this event.

The congress program placed play at the Berliner Schachgesellschaft clubhome in Charlottenburg. The draw was scheduled for 26 September, followed by the start of tournament play on Monday 27 September. The published congress dates ran through 9 October. The score headers retain their original partial dates and rounds rather than reconstructing a daily schedule.

◇The official result and Krusius’s omitted participation

The original congress book lists twelve starters, including Paul Krusius of Stuttgart. Its final table contains eleven players and omits Krusius. The surviving Wöhl–Krusius game remains in this archive, but it is excluded from the official standings and cross-table calculations. The reason and timing of Krusius’s departure have not been established from the acquired original pages.

The full final matrix contains 55 ordinary counted results. All eleven totals and 55 reciprocal results have been checked, and every available counted game agrees. With no contrary default or unplayed evidence identified in that matrix, 55 counted games are inferred to have been played. This is not a complete physical-play census including Krusius. Modern archive-derived notes and empty score headers cannot establish that wider total.

◇Surviving scores and source limits

The archive preserves 24 approved scores: 23 belonging to the official final table and one Wöhl–Krusius game. Thirty-two counted scores are absent from both approved archives and appear as missing in the table. No absent Krusius pairing is labelled a lost game. The number physically played in the whole original twelve-player event remains unknown.

All native moves and metadata are retained. The approved fallback calls Bodenstein “Paul” in three records, whereas the PostgreSQL source calls him “Hugo”; the original roster gives only his surname and Freiburg. No speculative name correction is made. A modern secondary ledger also mixes in a distinct December 1919 Sämisch–Schropp game and truncates Sämisch–Brinckmann; neither changes the approved native selection.

The original roster and full result table have been inspected, but no original full score or contemporary explanation of Krusius’s omitted results was obtained. The federation page transcribes the contemporary program and report; its added ChessBase note is identified separately from that original material.