Important Watches, Wristwatches and C...

Geneva, Hotel Des Bergues, Oct 12, 1996

LOT 403

Lecocq, Eleve du Gouvernement, Berthoud Professeur, No. 279, circa 1845. Rare and important marine chronometer, made in the Louis Berthoud style by one of the pupils of his son Charles Auguste Berthoud.

CHF 14,000 - 18,000

Sold: CHF 17,250

C. Double body mahogany box with slide on the lid over the glazed observation aperture. Brass gimbal with a ladded bowl. D. Silvered regulator type, with small Roman chapter ring for hours, subsidiary seconds below, outer Arabic minute ring on the border of the bezel. Blued steel Breguet hands. M. Brass full plate, fully jewelled, with conical pillars secured by pins. Fusee with chain, maintaining power, spring detent escapement, three-arm compensation balance, with three trapezoidal weights and timing screws, blued steel helical balance spring. Signed on the dial. In very good condition. Dial diam. 80 mm.


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Notes

A very similar chronometer by Auguste Louis Berthoud is described and illustrated by J.C. Sabrier in La longitude cum(?)] d 1'heure de Louis Berthoud et de Henri Motel, p. 315. Perrelet was in charge of the Ecole des Horlogers de la Marine since 1832, when he decided to resign in December 1839. Charles Auguste Berthoud was then appointed as his successor by the Ministre de la Marine, to complete the instruction of his pupils. Onesime Dumas was already there since 1837, but among the three other pupils, Louis Lecocq had just arrived in October 1839, therefore, he was almost entirely formed by Charles Auguste Berthoud. The calibre used for this chronometer, being of Louis Berthoud type, and the inscription on the dial: Eleve du Gouvernement, Berthoud Professeur, suggest it was made under the control of Charles Auguste Berthoud, probably as a masterpiece to mark the end of his studies. Therefore, it can he assumed that the. No. 279 is a Berthoud serial number, in the same way that the chronometer made by Henri Motel as a masterpiece, under the control of Louis Berthoud, carries the No. 140, which belongs to the Louis Berthoud production.