Rupert Cross

Rupert Cross

Sir Alfred Rupert Neale Cross (15 June 1912 in Chelsea, London – 12 September 1980, Oxford) was a prominent English lawyer and academic. He was Vinerian Professor of English Law at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford.

He was also completely blind from the age of 1, as a result of cancer of the eyes, and, before his distinguished legal career, was already well known as a chess player. As an undergraduate at Worcester College, Oxford he represented Oxford University four times (1931–34) on the top board in the prestigious annual Varsity chess match against Cambridge University. He played several times in the top section of the British Chess Championship in the 1930s (for which only an elite group of twelve players qualified).