Breguet

Breguet Ship Chronometer with unusual escapement

 

As promised, here are the pictures I had you clamoring (not begging, please, we all have our dignities! ) for...

From what I have been told, this chronometer has a strange story. It was first sold to a ship's capitain, who had to bring it back several times to the Breguet repair workshops as it was not keeping time accurately. The last time, he was so fed up with it that he simply told them to keep the damned thing and never went to take it back.



The tub in which is housed the movement is made of hard wood, which leads one to speculate as to how the gimbals and the rest of the box were made. Unfortunately, we will never know, as the famous capitain only brought back the watch but never its gimballed housing!



Much later on, apparently, someone saw this chronometer somewhere in some Breguet place, and decided he wanted to buy it. A new case for it was made, the watch got a second serial number (as was practice at Breguet whenever a watch was officially sold for a second time), and it was then delivered to its lucky new owner.



As you may be able to tell from the pictures, what makes this chronometer unusual is its special escapement, with a "split" anchor. It is quite mesmerising to watch it tick away, as the anchor literally does a "dance and step" each times it moves!





So... if your grandfather or great-grandfather was a ship's capitain, take a look in your attic! If you happen to find an empty Breguet gimballed ship chronometer's box with the right number on it, you may perhaps be able to make a claim for this movement!





Sorry for the poor quality of the pictures, but they were taken with a point-and-shoot digital camera as that was all I had on hand at the time.

Please note: copyright for these pictures is asserted, and they are not to be reused or reposted anyywhere else but on ThePuristS.com.

Cheers,