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This watch does not differ very much from the Johnson and Inskip
examples shown elsewhere on
this site; but, as Shakespeare almost
said, “I love it for the dangers it hath passed”. In plain
terms, I bought
it as a non-runner and succeeded, without expense, without special
equipment (my
only tools being pliers and screwdrivers), and indeed
without very much knowledge, in coaxing it to
the point where it has
now (October 2001) taken over as my everyday watch. Much of the
work involved
replacing damaged parts with substitutes from other
watches — a much easier task than one might suppose,
given the
hand-finished nature of English watches; it is known that the multitude
of small-town
makers depended on a few central suppliers for all the
mechanical parts, and clearly these suppliers
had quietly worked their
way to a very fair degree of standardisation before the nineteenth
century
was half over. The fusee-cone and chain, the spring-barrel and
(most surprisingly perhaps) the impulse-roller
with its jewel were all
replaced in this way; the last item came from a cheap Lancashire
Watch
Company movement of about 1900! Diameter 50mm.
Notice the flush (as opposed to sunken)
seconds dial with its large ten-second figures and the very large steel balance-wheel; these are
signs
of an early date (before about 1850) in an English lever watch.
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