Lot 116 - Napoleon's brother's Breguet quarter repeating coach watch

Hi, David Searles here from Jones & Warren Auction Company in Georgetown, New Hampshire. We have a wonderful sale of wristwatches, pocket watches, American watches, European watches, and jewelry coming up May 21st. It's going to be held at Radisson in downtown Manchester, New Hampshire. We have some 500 watches. And today we're just going to show you one of the more interesting pieces with kind of an interesting bit of research that we did on it. This is a massive 950 silver, in other words, 95% silver case coach watch that signed Breguet. Now we see lots of Continental watches that have the Breguet signature, but they're just simply things that were handled by the firm or examples of other companies putting a Breguet name on a watch to cash in on the fame of Breguet. But in this particular case, we noticed that this watch had some dramatic Breguet features to it. While everything about the watch appears to be Continental construction, when we went in to look at this timepiece, we discovered that we had the step-footed balance clock that's typical of Breguet, the parachute compensation curve that's typical of Breguet, the plate signature, which is in the identical script, almost like a signature done by at least one of Breguet's engravers. And it's also a hanging ruby cylinder escapement. It's operating now, but needs, of course, to be lubricated. It hasn't been touched in any way. This is a quarter-hour heater. There's a large bell, replacement bell, that's been made for this watch for some time in its history, which needs to be finished better. And it's also another cast material. It doesn't sound as good as a nice, properly done bell. But with a quarter-hour heater, this first strikes the hours, just a single strike for the hours, and then a single strike for each quarter. So that way, you can pull this in the middle of the night and tell what time it is for the last quarter. The interesting thing in this watch, when you take the bell out, is that it has lots and lots of French hallmarks. And the French hallmarks are very clear and very distinct. For example, one of them is a Paris hallmark for the period June 19, 1798 to September 1, 1809. That has a guarantee mark for large silver articles for the same period, and the number of the Paris Assay Office. The case has number 2208, but then there's another number, a B number, B2312. And B is a typical prefix that we see on watches that may have been finished in the Brigade's shop. So we started out with this watch thinking, here's an interesting thing with a lot of Brigade features. Well, one of the great friends of our company actually went and found the listing in the Brigade book for this watch. The watch was bought in on a watchmaker named Nicode, N-I-C-O-D, Nicode. And this would be the elder who was the father and son. And the father was working at this time, and probably with his son at his side. And the Brigade bought in this watch from them, and then did the finishing in the workshop. And then, in 1808, sold it to the King of Westphalia. Well, who was the King of Westphalia? He was the youngest brother of Napoleon Bonaparte, Girolamo Bonaparte, who ruled from 1807 to 1813. Westphalia is a province in northwestern Germany at the time. And so this was bought in the second year of his reign. So, very, very interesting confirmation where we have a confluence of different data. There's the physical data, which shows just exactly what the watch is, and the evidence of it going through the Brigade workshop. Then the confirmatory data coming from the Daison workbooks, which explain why it was in this form. It's not a typical Brigade form. And then, documenting the sale at precisely the time that the Parisian hallmarks on the case indicated. So, a wonderful bit of research, one of those rewarding things that happens to us. And Barlow put on a tremendous sale of watches, which included another watch by a Brigade, some fabulous wristwatches, some rare Rolex wristwatches, rare American wristwatches, many gorgeous watches, complicated watches by Pat McLean. And it's going to be an extremely exciting sale. Again, it's May 21st, 2017 at the Radisson. Our particular company is blessed having no sales tax due in the state of New Hampshire. We do not charge buyer's premium. And so, when you come to one of our sales, and if you're successful bidding something down for $10,000, say, that's all you pay. So, it's a nice thing, unless you need to have a check somewhere that has a small shipping cost. This particular watch was estimated at $6,000 to $12,000, which is going to be very interesting to see how people like it. The attribution of the Rolando Bonaparte could have an important factor in the kind of excitement that's generated over this piece. The size of it, just for fun, is 109 millimeters. For those of you who pay attention to millimeter sizes, we use 33 millimeters on wristwatches. But that is really quite a massive piece, and an extremely heavy case. Again, I say this is the top grade of silver that was done under the branch at $950 quality, with three grades of silver. And all I can tell you is that that's what it is. So, we look forward to seeing you at our auction, and hope you've enjoyed this little video. Thank you.