Lot 21

Henry-Lepaute

An important Parisian inverted Y framed skeleton precision table regulator of museum quality, with 8-day power reserve, date and month display, equation of time and half hour/hour strike

Sold

Several regulators of this type are known and described in books devoted to regulators or skeleton clocks. They are signed by the best makers such as Lepine, Lepaute and Breguet. Some of them are just precision time-keepers, others are set with a striking train or an equation of time. Their weight driven movements are all very similar, the lay out of the going train being almost identical and all seem to have been constructed in the same workshop.
Similar precision table regulators are illustrated in "Skeleton Clocks" by F. B. Royer-Collard, London 1977, p. 79 and cover and in "Continental and American Skeleton Clocks" by Derek Roberts, Pennsylvania 1989, pp. 62-67.

Pierre Henry-Lepaute was born on Thursday, August 22, 1743 in Thonne-la-Long/France. He was the son of farmer and ploughman Jean Henri (1705-1765) and Elisabeth Lepaute (1717-1748); he was a nephew of Jean André Lepaute and Jean Baptiste Lepaute. In 1769 he was appointed professor of watchmaking by Louis XVI. By circa 1780 he worked in Paris with Pierre Basile Lepaute at Jean-Baptiste Lepaute ‘s workshop in Paris. The workshop was taken over by Jean André and Jean Baptiste in 1789 and Pierre-Henry left the company in 1795. He was married to Gabrielle Michelle Geneviève Prevost.
Their only son, Augustin Michel Adam Henry-Lepaute, became a clockmaker and worked at J. J. Lepaute’s. Pierre Henry-Lepaute was severely injured during the explosion of a machine at Rue Saint-Nicaise in1800. He died on Wednesday, July 3. 1806 at the age of 62.
Source: watch-wiki.org