François Czapek Was a Polish émigré, who in 1831 arrived in Switzerland after the fall of the Polish insurrection against Russia. ot long after that date he established a watchmaking enterprise, called Czapek and Moreau. Mr. Moreau had a very beautiful niece who won the heart of another young Pole, Antoni Patek. The two became engaged, and three months short of their wedding date, Patek, Czapek, and Moreau signed an agreement establishing a new company - Patek & Czapek. The partnership lasted six years during hich some exceptional watches were produced. After the dissolution, Czapek founded "Czapek et Cie", also with a new partner, Juliusz Gruzewski. Czapek's new company did well. Gruzewski was a personal friend of apoleon III, and Czapek quickly became watchmaker to the court of the Emperor. He had a factory in Geneva, a shop in Warsaw, and another in Paris. He wrote a small book about watches and watchmaking in which he announced that he was working on a larger volume, but he unfortunately died be ore publishing it. An interesting fact is that Czapek's early watches incorporate Philippe's patented sliding pinion winding mechanism. In his book Czapek states that in his shop he used only this design. The highest serial number on a Czapek watch we have seen is 10705, and the lowest one is 1230, which leads us to conclude that he started numbering from 1000. We thus believe that Czapek's total production was about 9,000 watches. Among about 60 watches made or finished by Czapek that we have seen, certain ones are of outstanding quality. This comes as no surprise, for if he had not been an outstanding watchmaker, Patek would have never formed a partnership with him. The Patek Philippe Collection includes Czapek's regulator clock with a free, double wheel detent escapement. The King Farouk Collection had an outstanding gold and enamel cigar case combined with a watch, made for the Great Exhibition of 1851, which was sold y Antiquorum on April 25, 1993, lot 347. Charles-Louis-apoléon, Emperor apoleon III 1808-1873 The third son of Hortense Beauharnais, the daughter of Emperess Josephine and Louis Bonaparte, brother of apoleon I and king of Holland, he was born in the Tuileries Palace in 1808. He spent his childhood in exile in Switzerland and Germany. When he was born, neither the Emperor nor his older brother Joseph had a male child. Since the two other brothers, Lucien and Jerome, had been refused the right of succession, Hortense's three sons could legitimately hope to succeed their uncle, and were in eed raised with that idea in mind. Louis-apoleon as a young man was convinced that he had a political role to play. Although he had been expelled him from France by the government of Casimir Périer in 1831, he attempted a coup which failed. A descent on Boulogne in 1840 also failed, resulting in his being arresed, tried, and sentenced to life imprisonment. Louis-apoleon escaped from the fortress of Ham to England in 1846, returning to Paris following the 1848 revolution, which gave him his chance to finally take part in French olitics. He was elected to the ational Assembly, and shortly afterward, was elected President of the Second Republic, in great part due to the popularity of the apoleonic legend. On December 2, 1851, the anniversary date of the victory at Austerlitz, a coup was staged to enable Louis-apoleon to conserve his power. The following year, in 1852, he declared himself Emperor, taking the name of apoleon III he considered that apoleon Bonaparte's son, the Duke of Reichstadt, had reigned as apoleon II- though very briefly - in 1815. apoleon III sought to reestablish French power and prestige. With this aim in mind, he led France into the Crimean War 1854-55, after which he played a role in the negotiations of the peace treaty at the Congress of Paris in 1856. However, it was for his participation in Italian affairs that apoleon III was most often called a "liberator". Seeking to help Italy become free of Austrian domination, he met secretly at Plombières with Cavour the envoy of the King of Sardinia-Piedmont, Victor Emmanuel II, and promised to help in case of an attack by Austria. In the ensuing war, French troops helped the Italians acheive victory, in the decisive battles of Magenta and Solferino, and French troops received a triumphant welcome when they entered Milan on June 8, 1859. It was the terrible bloodshed at Solferino that convinced Henri Dunant to found to Red Cross France became involved in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, with disastrous results which led to apoleon III's being deposed as Emperor. He and his family went into exile in England, where the former Emperor died in 1873. The phrase "apoleon III, libérateur de l'univers" which is engraved on the watch may refer to the Emperor's support of the Italian cause. Eugénie Maria de Montijo de Guzman, Countess of Teba, Empress Eugénie. 1826-1920 Was born in Granada, the daughter of Dona Manuela, a lady of Scottish and American descent, and Don Cipriano, a Spanish grandee, who had been an ardent defender of apoleon I. When apoleon III, having recently proclaimed himself Emperor, was searching for a wife in order to assure his succession, he thought of Eugénie, whom he had met while traveling in Spain. The two were married in 1853 at otre Dame de Paris. The beautiful young Empress contributed greatly to the image and prestige of the reign; the fêtes given by the Imperial couple were sumptuous and became the talk of Europe. The birth in 1856 of the Imperial Prince Louis apoleon seemed to ensure the continuity of the reign, and Empress Eugénie was a doting mother, finding perhaps in her son's affection a compensation for apoleon III's notorious infidelity. She was however to outlive both her husband and her son by many years; the former died in exile in 1873, the latter was killed in 1879 during the Anglo-Zulu war, at the a e of only 23. The last portion of Eugénie's life, until her death in 1920, was a long and rather lonely period of retirement in England. apoleon I and apoleon III Louis-apoleon Bonaparte was brought up with the idea that he might one day succeed his uncle apoleon Bonaparte. The two failed "coups" of his youth, in Strasburg and Boulogne, were romantic, if awkward, attempts at continuing the apoleonic myth. In his book "Des idées apoléoniennes", he sought to transform romantic revery into a pragmatic form of Bonapartism. His unilateral proclamation of the Empire was thus no surprise. Indeed, he stated that only an Emperor could give France both "freedom and glory". A skillful politician, apoleon III was aware that the Bonaparte name, and nostalgia for the 1st Empire, were among his most effective arms in rallying the country to his cause. He considered that his uncle had defended the ideas of the French Revolution and given them consistency, and imagined a "dying Revolution" confiding its last wishes to apoleon I : "Enlighten the nations? establish on a firm foundation the principle results of our efforts. Broaden and extend what I achieved in depth. Be o Europe what I was to France." These were the ideals that apoleon III sought to defend when he came to the aid of Italy in her revolt against Austrian domination. The present watch, in which the portraits of apoleon III and Empress Eugenie are juxtaposed with that of "apoleon the Great", perfectly illustrates that conjunction of apoleonic ideals, as well as the romantic myth of apoleon as a "liberator". Was a Polish émigré, who in 1831 arrived in Switzerland after the fall of the Polish insurrection against Russia. ot long after that date he established a watchmaking enterprise, called Czapek and Moreau. Mr. Moreau had a very beautiful niece who won the heart of another young Pole, Antoni Patek. The two became engaged, and three months short of their wedding date, Patek, Czapek, and Moreau signed an agreement establishing a new company - Patek & Czapek. The partnership lasted six years during hich some exceptional watches were produced. After the dissolution, Czapek founded "Czapek et Cie", also with a new partner, Juliusz Gruzewski. Czapek's new company did well. Gruzewski was a personal friend of apoleon III, and Czapek quickly became watchmaker to the court of the Emperor. He had a factory in Geneva, a shop in Warsaw, and another in Paris. He wrote a small book about watches and watchmaking in which he announced that he was working on a larger volume, but he unfortunately died be ore publishing it. An interesting fact is that Czapek's early watches incorporate Philippe's patented sliding pinion winding mechanism. In his book Czapek states that in his shop he used only this design. The highest serial number on a Czapek watch we have seen is 10705, and the lowest one is 1230, which leads us to conclude that he started numbering from 1000. We thus believe that Czapek's total production was about 9,000 watches. Among about 60 watches made or finished by Czapek that we have seen, certain ones are of outstanding quality. This comes as no surprise, for if he had not been an outstanding watchmaker, Patek would have never formed a partnership with him. The Patek Philippe Collection includes Czapek's regulator clock with a free, double wheel detent escapement. The King Farouk Collection had an outstanding gold and enamel cigar case combined with a watch, made for the Great Exhibition of 1851, which was sold y Antiquorum on April 25, 1993, lot 347. Watches destined for Royal and Imperial families were often not signed by the watchmaker, and they were exempted from bearing the official guarantee marks. Many such watches are known. The best example may be a watch by Patek Philippe, o. 25308, ordered on the occasion of the Duke of Montpensier's marriage to Princess Luisa Fernanda on Oct 10, 1864, and now in the Patek Philippe Museum. Like the present watch, it is only stamped with the serial number. As to the identity of the maker of the present watch there is little doubt that it is François Czapek, who was watchmaker to Emperor apoleon III. Such an important watch would almost certainly be entrusted to the Imperial watchmaker. Further details support a Czapek origin. The serial number is consistent with Czapek's numbering system and corresponds roughly to the years 1859-60. Moreover, the case was made by the casemaker most often used by Czapek; the best example being watch o. 4354 Anti uorum, Geneva, 24 April 1999, lot 427 which is punched with the same casemaker's mark and enameled with the coat of arms of apoleon III.