English superb gold watch with regulator dial Circa 1824

Superb and rare gold precision lever watch with regulator dial
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An English superb and rare gold precision lever watch with regulator dial, circa 1824, gilded full plate movement, lever escapement, jeweled to the third wheel, two-arm bimetallic compensation balance, helical balance spring, engraved beat scale, fusee and chain, maintaining power, signed Thos. Cummins, 4-25, London, Invt. et Fecit.
Gold engine-turned regulator-type dial, satin-finished chapter rings, hour dial at 6 with Roman numerals, subsidiary seconds at 12 and outermost minute ring with Arabic numerals, blued steel hands
Gold case, engine-turned band, and back centered with the crest of a Peacock’s head, case with case maker’s mark LC with scroll above incuse for Louis Comtesse
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Diameter: 55 mm
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Signed: Thos. Cummins 4-25 London Invt. et Fecit
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Thomas Cummins is recorded by Loomes, in Watchmakers and Clockmakers of the World, as a member of the Clockmakers’ Company from 1806-1832. In their book Watches, Cecil Clutton and George Daniels noted: “This virtually unknown maker was almost certainly the first English maker to use the lever escapement in watches of the highest quality, when this escapement was revived after its almost complete neglect in England from 1800-1820. He appears to have started using the lever escapement soon after 1820, with a highly sophisticated form of Massey’s escapement” [see op. cit. 1^st Ed, 1965, p.130]. The lever escapement in the present watch is an enhanced form of Massey’s Type IV escapement withdraw and resilient banking, there is also maintaining power and Cummins’ own form of fusee stop device. There is no motion work between the hands so that frictional loss and variations due to it are avoided.

Approximately half a dozen watches signed by Thomas Cummins are known.

Thomas Cummins employed a ‘twin’ numbering system, comparing these numbers with the hallmark years of his known watches (remembering that the London hallmark year cycle changes in May i.e. covering approximately six months of two different years) the secondary number appears to represent the year of production, whilst the number which precedes the year is presumably the watch’s production number within that year.

The crest to the case back is that of Robert Smith, first Baron Carrington – the balance cock is engraved with the name I.W. Smith, 8 Gray’s Inn Square, it would seem that Robert’s crest was adopted by his brother or cousin, the first initial could be for John Smith, a member of the London banking family Smith Payne & Co. and M.P. for Nottingham (the J commuted, as was common, to I). Interestingly, Cummins no. 14-26 has a cock which also appears to be engraved for its original owner, in that case a certain H.L. Goater.