Lot 159

S. Smith & Son

A collection of 2 English carousel pocket watches
A rare London pocket watch with with 52,5 min. carousel - "KEW A Chronometer" - with extract from the chronometer archives by Andreas Hidding

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In 1897 this chronometer took part in the chronometer test at the Kew observatory, Old Deer Park, Richmond, London and achieved 85,5 points and the awarding "especially good" in the category "Kew - Class A", presentation engraving: "PRESENTED TO Mr. W. B. Cox by the Clergy & Congregation OF ST. COLUMBA GATESHEAD a memento of 17 years service as ORGANIST & CHOIRMASTER, 20th December 1898".

A leading firm in London for high quality and complicated watches at the turn of the century, S. Smith & Son was founded in 1851 by the jeweller and watchmaker Samuel Smith. In addition to the wide range of watches and clocks for private customers, Smith's also built reliable chronometers which made the firm a supplier to the Admiralty. Under the management of Herbert S.A. Smith the firm developed into a large manufacturing company that had its own research laboratories; in the next generation Sir Alan Herbert Smith extended the company product range further and began with the production of automobile and aircraft instruments. Around this time a period of general decline for British horology began; even so, a few British watchmakers created magnificent, ultra-complicated watches, as if to prove to the world that they were still the best. Some of these watches were made in collaboration with the most renowned Swiss watch companies.