@Airymouse I'm not sure. I'm more familiar with "staunch." "Stanch" looks OK to me as a verb, but odd to me as an adjective. I'd be inclined to pronounce "stanch" differently, to rhyme with "ranch" (although interestingly, dictionaries tell me that usually it's not pronounced like this). In that case, there would be a difference of pronunciation as well as a difference in spelling. I can't see the basis for objecting to "staunch" used as a verb, or "stanch" used as an adjective.
@Airymouse My spell-checker does flag "accompanyist." That's a case where the two spellings definitely correspond to different pronunciations for me. "Accompanyist" has an extra syllable. It does seem to be much rarer than "accompanist" in edited prose, and it seems to be a re-formation by analogy with "accompanist," so I understand why people would prefer it. It's kind of like "mischievous" vs. "mischevious."
