American silver hunting cased watch with chronograph Circa 1856

Silver hunting cased chronograph by Waltham Watch Co.
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A rare and early silver American pocket watch with chronograph, circa 1856.
It has a wonderfully preserved engine-turned silver case with gold hinges. A signed enamel dial with Roman radial hours, outer minutes/seconds track with Arabic minutes/seconds numerals, subsidiary dial for the seconds, and blued steel hands. And a very rare chronograph movement, signed Waltham Patent 3224, and with number 3160904.
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Diameter: 50 mm
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Weight: 118 g
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Signed: Am. Watch Co. Waltham
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Extremely rare American collector’s watch. The watch has been in a collection for decades and has not been running for long.
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Waltham Watch Co., an American pocket watch factory
The American Waltham Watch Company was founded in Roxbury, Massachusetts, in 1850 by David Davis, Edward Howard and Aaron Lufkin Dennison as the ” American Horology Company “. The concept was to produce completely interchangeable and highly standardized watch components.
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At the end of 1852, the first clocks were completed. The first 17 watches, stamped “The Warren Mfg Co” [1], were distributed among the company’s management. Watches numbered 18 through 100 were minted as “Warren Boston” and another 800 as “Samuel Curtis”. A smaller lot called ” Fellows & Schell ” were sold at $40.00 each.
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The Waltham Watch Company, under its various corporate names, has manufactured approximately 40 million wristwatches, grandfather clocks, wall clocks, tachometers, compasses, timers and other precision instruments of the highest quality in the United States over 100 years. Each work was individually numbered.