Detectoring

One part of the horology hobby so enjoyed by your clock fool is the investigation of a newly found object.

Who made it?

How old is it?

Who owned it?

How to fix it?

The lovely tall case this orphan adopter reported finding the other week... is now referred to as the Smith clock and it has turned out to be a detectives delight and challenge.

The kind reader may recall that the seller, Christine, had no info on it. Not a great start.

Your local horologist knows a few of the backroads of internet searching and has at his disposal the incomparable resources of the NAWCC.

Zo!

Searching for "Smith", "tall case", "Newburg", "long case", "grandfather clock" and variations therein provided very few useful results.

Newburg NY...

I don't think so.

Poring over the message boards of the NAWCC and tapping into their online library, which is extensive, produced very limited results other than narrowing down to the belief that this clock is English and of the Georgian era.

Nary a mention of Smith of Newburg.

Who was Smith?

What / where is Newburg?

Visual examination of hundreds of example photos resulted in no clocks that closely resembled our example. 

This wasn't going to be easy and required a step back. 

A rethink.

A reexamination.

Standing in front of the clock.

Staring at the dial.

Looking it over...

Doh!

It's not Newburg! It's Newbury!

Newbury of Berkshire is located about 60 miles due west of London.

Discovered not 2 minutes later after a tweaked Google search was an auction posting, undated but likely occurring just a few years ago.

Quoting that post's entire description here:

“Signed "Smith of Newbury," England, this late Georgian tall case or grandfather clock from around 1830 shows understated country house elegance. The fine grained oak case has mahogany banding and subtle inlaid stringing. The fine old finish has warm patina and just enough mars and shrinkage separations from age for antique character. A brass movement runs a full week and keeps excellent time, striking the hour on a bell, an has been professionally cleaned and oiled. The hand painted dial is original with wrought iron hour and minute hands. There is a calendar wheel, but these are often unreliable. Weights, pendulum and working door lock also appear original on this historic furniture. There have been restorations to the base. Newbury is an ancient town west of London. Size is 19" wide, 10" deep and 90" tall.”

And also from that post is a photo of their clock, shared below on the left.

That clock's photo was taken from a different position with correspondingly different lens lengths, lighting, color correction and more compared to my photo of the Smith clock on the right.

Nevertheless.

The geometry of the two clocks looks ever so slightly different in the base as do the cowls but this amateur photo scientist knows that this is due to the different lengths of lens used in the capture of the two photos. The use of a long lens, say a 100mm or more likely on the auction photo, would produce that flattening effect.

But the dial design, every bit of the wood inlay, the shape of the crown, the brass on the columns...

While unlikely to be the same clock (unless it was sun baked post-auction), it is certainly its twin. 

Same maker and model. 

For sure.

It is not easy to describe the stunning quality of the emotions that came to YLH upon this discovery. 

In several hours of pouring over the literature this clock sleuth found countless examples of tall case clocks. Many hundreds of examples posted on the NAWCC message boards. Many more than that on Google.

So many names. So many examples over the 300+ years of the major English tall case clockmaking era.

There were many thousands of English clock makers such that the search to get any info on this maker seemed like finding a needle in the haystack. 

After the dawning realization that the Smith clock was not from a major clockmaker, finding no examples whatsoever... to discover not just the maker but an example of the exact... same... model...

It's beyond any reasonable expectation... it's stunning. 

Ahem. Back to our story.

As part of the clock research Internet Boy discovered a web site that offers inexpensive access to a huge trove of information on historic English clockmakers. 

There are over 35,000 entries. That said, many of the larger, more well-established clockmakers have multiple entries but the gentle reader gets the point.

After the head slapping moment of realization that it was the town of Newbury and discovering the auction example, Detective Clock went back to that well.

There are 222 listings for British clockmakers named Smith and one, exactly one, Smith of Newbury.

The historic UK clockmakers site charges $3.50 for 24 hours of unlimited access to their records.

Ding.

The two records archived are the business / trade listings of the town of Newbury of Berkshire from 1830 and 1844 respectively. 

The 1830 entry includes:

Taverns & Public Houses

Tailors

Tanners

Salt Merchants    

Silk Throwers

Surgeons

Straw Hat Makers

And...

Watch & Clock Makers

Whereupon there is listed a single entry for...

"Smith Edward, Northbrook st"

And in the 1844 entry:

That's it kids.

The sum total of what Dr. Watson here could find.

Dog be praised.

I need a nap.

Now to get it running.