Coach Watch Series - 5: William Carpenter

I featured William Carpenter in a post here, ‘Soho Sophistication’, 29 January 2016 http://theoldwatchword.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/soho-sophistication.html.  On 14 May another of his watches was sold at the Dr. Crott auction at Frankfurt Airport – it’s an especially nice one too! 

Movement #4552 is quite small at 68 mm.  A particularly attractive feature is the visible escapement.

 

Courtesy of Auktionen Dr. Crott, Germany

 

Courtesy of Auktionen Dr. Crott, Germany

 

This very desirable watch sold for €13100, (£10,274).

Coach Watch Series - 4: The Brockbanks

The brothers John and Miles Brockbank were watchmakers active from the mid eighteenth to the early nineteenth centuries.  An excellent, highly detailed account of the business by Dr Alexander Stewart was published in Antiquarian Horology, volume 34, no. 6, December 2015.  Briefly, in summary: 

·         Main premises location, (from 1777), was 7 Cowper’s Court

·         The firm was initially noted for its musical Coach Watches

·         John, the dominant partner, became bankrupt in 1783, probably as a result of losses incurred in the hazardous export trade with the Far East

·         The firm’s most famous employee was Thomas Earnshaw

·         In the Earnshaw-Arnold disputed claim for credit for the ‘invention’ of the spring detent escapement, both sides argued that the Brockbanks had been guilty of leaking details of the escapement to their opponent

·         From 1789 the Brockbanks became best known for their Chronometers

·         After John’s death in 1806, Miles was briefly in partnership with John’s sons, John E and William, together with James Beck and William Grove

·         The firm became Brockbank & Atkins in 1815 and continued until 1835 in this guise 

According to Dr Stewart, eleven Coach Watches are known, made between 1780-95, within a number range, 1 – 11 and in varying sizes between 100 and 160mm.  This is number 8, a gilt hour repeater with music played on 6 bells.  It has a cylinder escapement and a lever operated mechanism to stop the centre seconds hand.  Diameter is 132mm.  How elegant is that?

 

Courtesy of La Cote des Montres

 

 

 

 

Small is Beautiful

‘Clocks’ Magazine in its April 2016 issue has published the first part of my article on Alexander Watkins.  Watkins was making fine chronometers in the mid-nineteenth century, trading from a prestigious London address: 67 Strand. 

For students of horology, Watkins is best known for his ‘miniaturised’ chronometer made for the 1851 Great Exhibition.  With its unusually small movement and gold, delicately ornamented case, it is a very fine aesthetic and technical achievement.  However, as I often find, there’s as much interest in a watchmaker’s personal story and the social/commercial setting in which he worked as in his design and manufacturing activities. 

So my article, whilst detailing some of Watkins’s watches and movements and his ideas for simpler watches to combat the influx of Swiss timepieces, also explores the circumstances of an attempted murder and the very marked divide in Victorian society between an affluent family and an ‘ordinary’ one.

 

1851 Great Exhibition gold chronometer

Courtesy of Sotheby’s

 
Watkins left a legacy of innovation and quality of work confirmed by the examples held in the collections of The British Museum and The Worshipful Company of Clockmakers.

Coach Watch Series - 3: Timothy Williamson

In the late eighteenth century some notable export businesses were built in London, clocks and watches often being the stock-in-trade.  There was considerable demand from the Ottoman Empire, China and India for highly decorative pieces of a quality standard not met by local craftsmen.  Perhaps the best known English entrepreneur was James Cox, to whom I referred in my post, ‘Soho Sophistication.’  Timothy Williamson, like Cox, was not a horologist himself, his own craft skills being those of the goldsmith.

Britten’s dates/locations are: 1768-88; 196 Fleet Street (1769-75); 59 Fleet Street (1777-83); 90 Great Russell Street (1785-88). 

Roger Smith, writing in Antiquarian Horology, says:  ‘The goldsmith Timothy Williamson may have organised the making of his own distinctive cases, but their movements could well have been supplied by the well-known clockmaker, William Hughes, with whom Williamson has close links.’ 

Working dates for Hughes according to Britten’s were 1766-94.  He worked at 119 High Holborn, an address which became famous as being that of Thomas Earnshaw, who took over Hughes’s business.  Earnshaw, though already time-served when he arrived in London, looked upon Hughes as his mentor. 

This Coach Watch ‘by’ Williamson was made for China.  Diameter is 85mm and the movement number is 3416, probably 1785-90.  It is a twin train verge with Grand Sonnerie strike, moon-age and centre seconds complication.  The case is gilt with paste stone decoration: 

Courtesy Ashland Investments

A similar style watch by Williamson, number 2780, was offered, but not sold by Antiquorum at a Geneva sale in October 2000, with estimate of $14,000 - $17,000.  That one’s diameter was no less than 140mm.

Hughes’s own watches tended to be plainer, though of high quality, and he signed the dial:

Courtesy of artclock.nl

Coach Watch Series - 2: John Grantham

John Grantham’s life and work is not well documented. The Baillie entry is simply: London. Mid 18c. g. rep. agate watch Stern coll.  Loomes records just the date 1762.  As for premises, Swallow Street, St. James, Piccadilly is recorded for 1779. 

I have found 6 other extant Grantham verges – all but one are flamboyant in appearance. 

This example was made in London around 1760 for export to China.  Movement number is 6828.  Diameter is 76mm.  It was sold in 2012 by Jones & Horan for $7,000.  It is also to be seen on the website of Stephen Bogoff.

 

Courtesy of Stephen Bogoff

  

In the period the cases of watches destined for China were very highly
decorated, with the use of multiple materials to complement the multi-functionality of the movement. This is well illustrated by another Grantham watch to be seen on Sotheby’s website.

 
This is not a Coach Watch, being just 43mm in diameter. However, it has many of the features associated with more opulent, larger format examples. Sotheby’s description should have you clicking the link in order to see such indulgence: 

A FINE AND RARE GOLD, AGATE, DIAMOND AND RUBY SET QUARTER REPEATING VERGE WATCH CIRCA 1750

Gilt full plate verge movement signed John Grantham London, pierced and engraved balance cock • white enamel dial, Roman numerals • pierced and engraved inner case, outer set with repoussé scrolls, moss agate plates on the case back and bezel, ruby and diamond-set motifs on the edges, diamond-set push button piece to the band • signed on the movement  

 

http://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2010/important-watches-ge1004/lot.114.html 

Function or Fashion?

The original draft of my article on John Grant of Fleet Street, published in the February 2016 issue of Clocks Magazine, included some extensive narrative about and depiction of Benjamin Webb’s Patent Polar Watches.  During the editing process a good deal of this was removed, mainly because of some difficulties experienced with the copyright holders for the images I had intended to use for illustrative purposes.  Subsequently the issue has been resolved – not just in regard to the specific material, but as a broad principle.  As a matter of policy, the Museum of the History of Science, Oxford has now decided to allow images available on its website to be freely downloadable for use by academic publications with a low print-run.

John Grant’s business was distinguished by an innovative approach both to manufacturing and retailing.  This latter aspect was well evidenced by the offering of Webb’s Polar Watches.  These dual-purpose instruments are certainly interesting in their own right.  They are an example of a favourite ‘branch’ of watchmaking of mine: multi-functionality – a trend that emerged in the late 18^th/early 19^th centuries, including Coach Watches – with four or five time metrics – Chronographs, and such as the Watch-Pedometers of Ralph Gout and Polar Watches of Benjamin Webb. 

I’d like to reproduce here the ‘look’ of the Polar Watches and the related promotional material as I believe it represents the period extremely well:

The Times 9-10-1799

 

 

© Museum of the History of Science, University of Oxford

 

Sotheby’s offered a Polar Watch, #81, at their sale, ‘Important Watches, Clocks and Automata’, 20 October 2009, New York, with an estimate of $5,000-$7,000:

 

Courtesy of Sotheby’s

 

This is #146, sold by Sotheby’s in 2002 for £1,292:

 

 

Courtesy of Sotheby’s

#45 can be seen on the Antiquorum website.  It is very similar to #81. 
 

#123 – movement only, is held at The British Museum and further examples are in the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers’ collection, (#129) and York Castle Museum.  According to Paul Tuck, in his ‘Horology Under the Hammer’, Antiquarian Horology, Vol 21, #2, 1993, the Polar Watch featured a Duplex escapement. 
 

Although Webb liked to feature, ‘The King’s Patent’, prominently, it was not his own.  The reference is to Patent #2280, December 1798, in the name of John Randall Peckham of Bermondsey.

 

Webb was amongst the Makers quoted in a 1798 Parliamentary Report on the petitions for repeal of the Duties on Clocks and Watches Act 1797.  Webb summarized his loss of business with the following data:

 

	1796	1797	1798	Decrease from 1st July to 31st December:
From January 1st to June 30th	1,220	1,088
July 1st to December 31st	1,990	565
Total	2,410	1,653		625
In the last Four Months				Decrease in:
November	231	123		November  108
December	126	53		December    73
January	101	125	47	January       78
February	249	267	6	February    261   Total         520

Webb stated that he had been in business for 27 years and had never before seen such a sudden fluctuation in business volume.  He added that it had become very common to substitute silver/base metal for gold in the making of cases.

 

Evidence from John Grant was also heard in regard to the Act. 
 

The Polar Watches are usually ascribed to the dates, circa 1800-05, and evidence of Webb’s subsequent prosperity is lacking.  The British Museum notes him as active up to 1811.  Although the trading title, Benjamin Webb & Son was in use at the time of the marketing of the Polar Watches, little is known about his offspring, James.  Baillie lists him: London (St John’s Sq) 1799.  There is also a Robert with St John’s Sq given as location, and dates 1815-25.

 

Although the Polar Watch concept and its marketability were unproven, just in case it was about to become highly sought after, the commercially vigilant Swiss were not slow to create similar – though less elegant – similar instruments, this for example:

 

Courtesy Cogs & Pieces 

 

The theoretical ‘need’ for Webb’s creation was probably not sustained by practical experience.  The carrying of a compass would not have been especially onerous for a mariner or explorer, used to working with one in any event.  Equally, a relatively small compass housed in tandem with a timepiece would be unlikely to offer the accuracy/stability of a stand-alone instrument.  No doubt there was an initial talking-point value whereby the flourishing of his Polar Watch emphasised the trendiness of a young Gentleman about Town.  However, as the new century got into its stride the underlying quality and elegance of form implied by the term ‘Chronometer’ probably soon attracted the fashion-conscious watch buyer’s attention, at the expense of a ‘novelty’ such as Webb’s.

 

That Arm Must be Tired by Now

I have waited over 60 years to become an owner of one of these, so its arrival in the post today was quite an event:

 

It reminded me of my excitement when the new issue of the Eagle comic arrived weekly.  In modern parlance, the production values of the Eagle were astonishing in the relatively austere early Fifties.  The use of colour and illustration detail were ground-breaking. 

Dan Dare, on the front cover, was certainly the star turn and amongst the character-branded merchandise, the watch was our Holy Grail of the times.  The sub seconds dial and automaton arm/ray gun added considerable sophistication.

 

My new acquisition is the earlier version, made in 1953.  The Eagle publishers decided that the Ingersoll dial script was too assertive and ordered a replacement variant where ‘Dan Dare’ was substituted for the maker’s name and ‘Made in Great Britain’ was removed. 

I now need to find an original box – probably much rarer than the watch itself, so I’ve started saving!

© Trustees of the British Museum