111st Auction

2024/11/16

Lot 77

Joseph Thaddäus Winnerl

An important deck chronometer with 36h power reserve indicator

Sold

estimated
3.6005.000 €
Price realized
4.500 €
specific features
Case
Later brass bowl with bayonet fitting by E. Fröhlich, Berlin 1908, three part mahogany box.
Dial
Enamel.
Movement
Full plate movement, chain/fusee, spring detent escapement according to Thomas Earnshaw, bimetallic chronometer balance with 2 platinum and 2 gold screws and 2 movable platinum weights, freesprung blued helical balance spring.
Diam.60 mm
Circa1850
Ctry.France


This pocket chronometer movement has recently been professionally cleaned.


Joseph Thaddeus Winnerl (1799-1886) was born on January 25th, 1799 in Mureg/Styria. He served an apprentice for Georg Schmidt Fidel in Graz, and qualified in 1816. Beginning in 1823 Winnerl worked in Breslau and then for Kessels in Altona, for Urban Jurgensen in Copenhagen and from 1829 in Paris, where among others he worked for Breguet et fils. In 1831 he produced the first pocket watch with "seconde independante". Its centrally positioned seconds hand could be stopped and then started again independently from the clockwork any number of times, however after the completion of the timekeeping it would only slowly go back to zero. Only then could a new timing process be initiated. In 1832 he started his own business in Paris and produced marine chronometers, precision pocket watches and precision pendulum clocks.