Watch

This pocket watch was sold by Jefferys and Jones, a firm of goldsmiths and jewellers with a shop on Cockspur Street near Charing Cross. Jefferys and Jones were well known as retailers of silverware but also finely decorated watches like this one. Jones became the Royal Goldsmith in 1783.

By the end of the eighteenth century London watch making had become highly specialised with an increasing number of outworkers manufacturing components for firms like Jones and Jefferys. Although their names appear engraved on the watch movement, they would probably only have assembled the parts. The watch has a gold pair case. The outer case is decorated with a ring of red enamel inset with white enamel circles. On the case back the purple enamel centre is bordered by the same design around a red enamel guilloche.