Here, we're going to learn how pawns move. We'll be using the animated
chessviewer to illustrate the various moves. Use the > and < buttons
underneath the chessboard or
click on the moves one by one to see how pawns move. Play it back and forth
as many times as you want to understand how pawns moves.
1.f4
First of all, on its initial move from the second or seventh rank, a pawn can be moved forward one OR TWO squares! Here, we decided to move the pawn forward two squares. Let's see it again with a black pawn...
1...c5
The pawn moved forward two squares. But now for the rest of the game, the pawn can only move forward one square at a time...
2.f5
The pawn moves forward one square now, not two...
2...c4
...one square at a time.
3.h3
Here we decided to move one square forward on the pawn's first move.
3...a6
...one square, but it could have moved two...
4.h4
..but as before, now it can only move forward one square from here on out,
4...a5
and in the case of this pawn, now it can't move forward anymore because there's something blocking it's path. Now let's see how pawns capture...
5.g4
This pawn uses its first move to move forward 2 squares...
5...hxg4
and the black pawn captures it by moving diagonally one square. The white pawn is removed from the board and the black pawn takes its place.
6.h5
But now, since the black pawn got out of the way, this pawn can continue to move forward... one square at a time.
6...c3
...one square at a time...
7.h6
...one square... Now let's see that capture move again.
7...b5
The black pawn moves forward 2 squares on its first move....
8.axb5
..and the white pawn captures it by moving diagonally to the black pawn's square.
8...a4
..nothing blocking this pawn's path now, so it proceeds on down the road...
There's a couple of other moves that pawns can make. One is called 'capturing another pawn en-passant' and the other involves moving a pawn all the way down to the end of the board, where it gets 'promoted' to another kind of piece. We'll get into those two moves later on.