Maurice Harrison-Gray (1899 – 24 November 1968),[1] known always as 'Gray', was an English professional contract bridge player. For about thirty years from the mid-thirties to the mid sixties he was one of the top players, and won the European Championship four times - in 1948, 1949, 1950 and 1963.[2]
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Gray was the child of an English father and an American mother. Much of his childhood was spent in Paris, and he became bilingual. He was educated at Haileybury School and served in the British Army at the end of World War I. In his younger days he boxed, played rugby and tennis, rode motorcycles, but leg injuries stopped his sporting activities.[3] During World War II he was a Flight Lieutenant in the RAF. Later, he became an ardent lepidopterist, breeding tropical moths at his Hampstead home.
Gray turned to bridge at 30 after a series of accidents at sports, including a motor-bike accident at 100mph. Within three years he was bidding for Britain in radio matches against the US and Australia. [4]
Gray participated in the development of the Acol System of bidding, He was captain of the winning Acol team in the years before World War II, the other team members being his partner, S.J. (Skid) Simon, Jack Marx, Iain Macleod and Colin Harding: a stellar group indeed. Gray was also instrumental in helping, in 1938, to unite the two warring bridge organisations (The British Bridge League, f.1931, and the National Bridge Association, f.1933) into one.
After the war the line-up of the British teams generally included Boris Schapiro, Terence Reese, Kenneth Konstam, Leslie Dodds, and Edward Rayne, initially with Gray as captain. These teams won the European title three times running. In London, 1949, the England team of Gray, Konstam, Reese and Schapiro defeated the American team of Crawford, Rapee, Stayman and Leventritt by 2,950 points over 96 boards for the Crowninshield trophy. A British team captained by Gray, but without Reese and Schapiro, were defeated by the USA in the first Bermuda Bowl.
To summarise, Gray was European champion in 1948, 1949, 1950 and 1963. He led Britain in the Bermuda Bowl in 1950, and played in the World Pairs 1962, World Team Olympiad 1964 and the European Championships in 1958. He won the Gold Cup seven times, and many other national events. The first time, in 1937, was with the original Acol team; the last time in 1968 was with Tony Priday, Nico Gardener, Albert Rose and the Sharples brothers: also a star-studded team. [5]
Like many other players of his day, Gray played rubber bridge almost daily. He used his bridge columns to champion the losing trick method of evaluating hands for suit contracts. Gray was bridge editor of the Evening Standard and Country Life for many years. [6]
Gray's career as an international was interrupted for about seven years after a strange incident in 1951. He withdrew from the trials at an early stage, leaving his partner high and dry, and announced his retirement from international competition, without giving reasons. Thus, he did not play in the 1951 European championship, but he gave a lengthy account of it in a press report, which attacked the performance of the British team (who came third to Italy and Austria). An editorial in the English Bridge Union's official medium gave an unforgettable response:
This was a strange performance from Gray, especially given his motto for playing at the table, which was "Keep icy calm". The response from the British Bridge League, responsible for team selection at European and World events, was: "The British Bridge League have decided that Mr Harrison-Gray will not be considered for selection in the team to represent Great Britain in the European Championship in 1952." [8] He did not play again for Britain until Oslo 1958.
According to Richard Fleet, his long-term bridge partner Jack Marx wrote after his death:[9]
Like many talented people, he was apt to be touchy at even implied criticism of his talent; and disagreements on impersonal issues were apt with him to become personal disputes. These failings perhaps accounted for his long and sterile feud with the [BBL].
In 1951 Boris Schapiro wrote an article giving his opinion of the top players of the day. This was his assessment of Gray:
Eleven years later, Schapiro updated his article: