Just wondering if anyone can tell me anything about this watch. It is stamped as "Warranted Alluminium Gold" and It also has "Awarded to Pike Medals Exhibitions 1867 and 1898 For Excellency" on the inner case. To be honest I think it looks a bit tatty but I have no clue about these things and thought I'd ask some folks who might know what they are talking about.
It was my late father in law's and my husband is curious about its history/value.
Pocket watch movements and cases were often sold separately. The movement should say something on it and the case does show the maker but it is too small to make out.
Post what it says on the movement and also what it says on the inside of the case in picture three.
The movement has S F stamped on it and in picture 3 the crest says Warranted Alluminium Gold with a Lion in the middle and the letter "M" beneath it. The numbers stamped below the crest are 1644.
Ha ha ha.... well I did say I have no clue about this. That is the only letters I can see on the movement there are two numbers though "50" and "67"... thanks for your reply!
I'm not sure if this is relevant here, but in the 1800's, aluminum was considered to be a precious metal, partly due to its being very difficult to refine.
The movement is a fairly generic cylindre escapement Swiss bridge movement from the mid to late 18th century. Something rather like this (this is just an example, not just the movement but even the maker may differ from yours):
As such, it will be difficult to identify the maker at all unless you find some markings. These may be found under the dial on the main plate of the movement but you would need to have the thing disassembled to get at them.
Well, it's pretty clear that "S/F" stands for "Slower/Faster"; I dont' think there are any other languages where S and F apply. England was always one of the big watchmaking centers, so English watches would have been labeled S and F. The original "Swiss Fakes" were meant to pretend to be English watches, so such watches would also have been labeled "S" and "F".
That said, its not that they were intended for English markets so much as they were intended to suggest that they were English made.
As far as I could observed the swiss makers produce for the special markets on the continent. The british market with colonies was very important during this period as Aditya explained. It was a country where quite many people could affort watches and it was the centre of fine watch making. This typical swiss bridge bar movements with cylindre escapement were made for the low coast sector in comparison to english movements. The industrial volume production races up very fast in switzerland while the english watchmakers in hole still prefer more handcaft. It's a little bid like swiss/chinese nowadays . Sometimes you find special movement modifications with 3/4 or 1/2 boards only for the english market and F/S. The german market was big but not so 'special' and rich. You sometimes find watches with N/V (nach/vor) often in combination with A/R. The region around La chaux-de-fonds is near the border to france and esspecially the watchmakers use traditional a 'special' frensh colored vernacular. Die offical terminologie for swiss watchmakers was french, as it was spoken french in the west of switzerland and a lot of raw movements in the beginning were sold in france (beaucourt/besancon)
In my opinion there were mainly recognized by product "styling" : The engish market, the osman market, the russian market, the asia market , american market and the rest. Some manufactures more and some less or no adapts.
This watch here has a common movement but a rare and special case as marks55 mentioned. I've seen those cases with standart movements sometimes in the bay but never in real life until now. You also find aluminium cases pocket watches by V+C.
..thanks for the compliment but of course and sorry : Vor (V) = advanced and Nach (N) = retard therefore : VN
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