Rare English cylinder watch with centre seconds Circa 1737

Silver pair cased cylinder watch with center seconds and stop slide
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A very fine and rare English silver pair cased cylinder watch with center seconds and stop-slide, circa 1737, gilded full plate movement, cylinder escapement, decoratively pierced balance cock engraved with foliage and grotesque mask at the neck, flat balance, diamond endstone, fusee and chain, Egyptian pillars, signed Geo. Graham, London, gilt metal dust cap similarly signed.
Silver champlevé dial, Roman numerals, outer Arabic minute ring, blued steel beetle and poker hands, steel centre seconds hand.
Plain silver inner case, stop slide beneath the bezel at 9 o’clock and with engraved S to the bezel above, the back with shuttered winding aperture, plain silver outer case, both cases with maker’s mark IW beneath a star incuse for John Ward.
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Diameter: 52 mm
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Signed: Geo. Graham London
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A limited number of watches were produced with centre seconds during the first half of the 18^th century and Graham appears to have made most of them. The hour and minute hands have been blued in the usual manner whilst the centre seconds hand has been left polished to provide contrast. A start/stop lever below the bezel of the inner case operates a ‘whip’ which is mounted between the plates and acts on the outer circumference of the cylinder.

George Graham (1674-1751) was one of England’s most renowned clock and watchmakers. He served his apprenticeship with Henry Aske in 1688 and then entered the service of Thomas Tompion as a journeyman in 1695. Graham married one of Tompion’s nieces and became his partner in 1704, succeeding to the business on Tompion’s death in 1713. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1721 and Master of the Clockmakers’ Company in 1722. It is believed that he improved or perhaps invented the cylinder escapement. He used the verge escapement up to 1726 and then predominantly the cylinder thereafter. On his death in 1751, as a sign of the great respect in which he was held, Tompion’s grave in Westminster Abbey was opened to receive the body of his former partner.