Eight-day long case clock, English, 1715-1725, inscribed 'Windmills London'. Oak and pinewood, carved, red with silvered decoration

LONG-CASE CLOCK : Oak and pinewood with decoration: a) lacquered in gold, green on a red ground, and b) carved in open work and silvered: brass fittings. The hood is in the form of an entablature surmounted by a pair of brass shaft-and ball finials flanking a four-sided domed top. Glazed dial door, the frame decorated with small landscapes and foliage in the Chinese style.
Long-case door decorated with a large-scale landscape showing seated figures in the Chinese style. Sides decorated with devices of flowers and foliage. At the rear corners of the case is a pair of silvered openwork brackets flush with the back. Rectangular skirted base with landscape and floral devices.
[From acquisition description]

Case:
Oak and pine with carved, japanned with raised gesso and silvered decoration. Break-arch trunk door with moulded edge; concave moulding below hood flanked by carved decorative brackets. Sliding hood with caddy top with carved frets, flanked by ball and spire finials on short pedestals. Break-arch glazed door with attached capped columns capped with gesso to front, capped quarter columns to rear. Break-arch front with carved frets to frieze and concave section to cornice; frets continuing around hood sides. Hood sides with break-arch glazed panels. Rectangular plinth with moulded border, double plinth with base and shallow feet. At trunk top, seatboard rests on extra wooden blocks mounted on either side of chops.

Dial:
Brass, break-arch, total height 17½ inches, central portion 13 inches square. Wheatear engraved border to dial plate, centre matted with ringed decoration to the three winding squares and seconds aperture. Large cherub head spandrels each secured by a single screw in main dial plate corners. Pinned to the dial plate is the silvered brass chapter ring with engraved minute and quarter hour bands, Arabic minute numerals at intervals of five, Roman hour numerals and small, lozenge-shaped, half quarters. Floating engraved fleur-de-lis half hour markers are situated above lozenges on the quarter hour band. At the lower part of the chapter ring between numerals V to VII is engraved: Windmills London. Pinned to the dial plate below "XII" is the subsidiary seconds ring of silvered brass with an engraved seconds band and Arabic seconds numerals at intervals of five; its diameter is such that space exists between the bottom of the ring and the central hole for the hands. Foliate engraving in arch flanks calendar, consisting of a silvered and matted brass star design to centre, with a silvered circumferential engraved band, each division containing Arabic numerals 1-31. Date indicated by hand. Four dial feet are attached to movement front plate by pinning. Plugged rectangular slot below calendar. Additionally, an unused threaded and steady pin hole is concealed by the proper left upper spandrel.
Hands:

Pierced steel minute and hour, the hour having a small tail. Seconds hand with contoured centre. Steel calendar hand.

Movement:
Brass and steel, weight driven, quarter chiming of eight-day duration, with recoil escapement, pendulum regulated. Six finned pillars and central knop, riveted to the backplate, pinned to the front. Outer surface of frontplate has scribed laying-out lines. Quarter chiming on eight bells controlled by small diameter countwheel mounted on outside of backplate; adjacent to this countwheel is a sprung lever, its purpose to allow manual release of chiming train for synchronisation if required. Hour striking on bell controlled by inside countwheel with a small aperture in backplate to allow observation of countwheel detent. Brass train wheels with four semicircular crossings, including cannon pinion and minute wheels. Where visible wheels with scribed lines evident, except chime hoop wheel. Wheel collets of two distinct profile types: domed, and double cylindrical. Latter found on: going escape, striking warning and quarter chiming train except second. Wheel between chime second and pin barrel is pinker in colour than other brass wheels. Steel arbors barrel-shaped with short pinion heads except striking warning, fly, going escape and chime fly. Steel recoil anchor pallets spanning 7½ teeth of escape wheel are attached to pallet arbor by a double-profiled brass collet. Drive to calendar in the arch starts from hour wheel which carries on its outside a 24-hour pinion which meshes with a 24-hour wheel, this engaging a lever once a day. The 31-toothed calendar wheel with jumper is mounted on a cock on underside of dial, its arbor passing through a hole in the dial to which calendar hand is pinned, and appears to be advanced by a sprung pawl carried on the lever. Scribed lines on the front plate do not correspond fully with present positioning of chime train mobiles. Located by the existing hammer rack, unused plain and threaded holes on back plate correspond with a cut out potion of front plate. The chime barrel, itself with plugged holes, can be pumped to play more than one tune by means of a substantial lever, but is not acted on by any device so cannot be altered. Pump lever position corresponds with the vacant holes concealed by dial spandrel. A vacant threaded hole on the back plate corresponds with similar on front plate. Calendar-actuating lever with semicircular cutout along its length. Front fly pivot and escape arbor pivot both run in eccentric plugs mounted in front plate.

Description and notes by Francis Brodie, c. 2008

Bequeathed by Mr. Edward Hudson

Bequeathed by Edward Hudson (RP 1323/37)

Maker's details:
Early days little known. 1671 Freedom of the Clockmakers Company, being described as a Great Clockmaker, perhaps transferring from another Livery Company. 1699-1702 served in Clockmakers Company becoming Junior Warden to Master. By 1682 at St Martin’s-le-Grand, by about 1674 to Mark Lane End, next to Tower Street (Neale, J.A. Joseph and Thomas Windmills, Clock and Watchmakers: 1671-1737, Wadhurst, 1999). In about 1700 went into partnership with his son (Thomas) who appears to have been apprenticed to his father in 1687, becoming Free in 1695 and Master of Clockmakers Company 1702, dying in 1732 (Jagger, C., Royal Clocks: The British Monarchy and its Timekeepers 1300-1900, London, 1983; Neale, J.A. Joseph and Thomas Windmills, Clock and Watchmakers: 1671-1737, Wadhurst, 1999). After the partnership started, appears that Windmills is mostly the partnership signature (although a few might have existed signed Windmills but only actually by his son, Thomas (Neale, J.A. More Tilting at Windmills. Antiquarian Horology, Vol.17, No.6, Winter 1988, pp563-582). Joseph was the clock specialist in the partnership with Thomas (Neale, J.A. More Tilting at Windmills. Antiquarian Horology, Vol.17, No.6, Winter 1988, pp563-582). Seems to have died c. 1722 (Jagger, C., Royal Clocks: The British Monarchy and its Timekeepers 1300-1900, London, 1983).

Remarks:
The japanned clock case appeared towards the end of the seventeenth century but reached its popularity during the eighteenth century and despite declining underwent a revival towards the end of that century.

The break-arch dial is reckoned to have been introduced in the longcase clock by Tompion for the Bath Pump Room in 1709 but Windmills was one of the earliest makers to adopt it (Neale, J.A. Joseph and Thomas Windmills, Clock and Watchmakers: 1671-1737, Wadhurst, 1999). The half hour markers are floating, although Robey comments that this was observed in a Windmills clock as early as 1714, with other makers adopting them by about 1730 (Robey, J.A. The Longcase Clock Reference Book. Ashbourne, 2001). The cherub head spandrels found on this Windmills were uncommon until c. 1685 whilst the wheatear engraving also seen here tended to go out of fashion after 1720 but was retained in London clocks until c.1740. The star design of calendar is a feature commonly used by Windmills.

Neale studied and reported on this clock for his book, commenting that Edward’s Dictionary of English Furniture dates it at c.1730-35 although but Neale reckons this is rather late, in view of the movement design. Judging by the scant remains of a label pasted on the inside of the trunk door, Neale is able to attribute W.17-1937 to the Windmills partnership by comparing its details with that of another partnership clock bearing the same type of label (Neale, J.A. Joseph and Thomas Windmills, Clock and Watchmakers: 1671-1737, Wadhurst, 1999).

Dating W.17-1937 is not clear, as it shows some features which might be considered ‘early’ such as the chiming and striking trains being controlled by countwheels. Other known examples with comparable details may be found with racks controlling the striking and chiming (where fitted), perhaps thought of as ‘later’ features. At this period, styles would have overlapped, alternatively stocks were being used, or purchased from other makers.

W.17-1937 has the hour hand with a small tail, a feature usually associated with an alarm. Whilst this clock does not have an alarm, other Windmills longcases do, for example TLC, a three-train with central alarm rose in the Gersholm Parkington collection, Sufffolk and a two-train seventeenth century longcase with 10 inch dial and alarm (Ullyett, K. In Quest of Clocks. London, c.1950; St Edmundsbury Borough Council Museum’s Service. The John Gershom Parkington Time Measurement Instruments, Bury St Edmunds, 1979). The hour hand is a replacement but it is interesting to note that it does have the tail.

The additions at the top of the chops may be a pointer to some alteration. As things stand, they raise the seatboard so that the dial fits the mask of the hood nicely. For some reason the present seatboard is too thin to achieve this without help. It is possible that the seatboard may have failed or distorted in the past from having to bear the full mass of the substantial movement, dial and triple weights.

The dial and movement appear to have been modified, principally the chiming mechanism, probably in the nineteenth or early twentieth centuries:
The plugged holes in the chime barrel and cut-out around the hammer rack suggest that these alterations have been carried out to allow the clock to play more than one tune on a greater number of bells than originally. Alterations to the chime barrel and hammer rack probably required new gears including, for example, the pink coloured gear wheel. That the scribing out lines on the front plate (originally used by the maker to locate the mobiles) no longer correspond with part of the chiming wheel work is further evidence of change. The style of the replaced components, for example the double-profiled, cylindrical collets, parallel arbors and longer pinion heads, are characteristic of nineteenth or early twentieth century work.

The unused threaded holes front and back may correspond with a chime work/silent mechanism. The plugged portion of the dial below the calendar aperture and unused holes on the underside of the dial by the spandrel could be evidence of previous selectors (now missing) for chime on/off, strike/silent or tune-changes. The semicircular cut-out in the calendar operating lever was most likely put in to miss such a selector lever during part of its cycle. What is a little odd is that these modifications are now incomplete. One possibility is that these were concealed at a still later date, so as to allow the clock to be passed off as original to an unsuspecting buyer; in its present condition it could at least chime and strike at a basic level.

Description and notes by Francis Brodie, c. 2008

Thomas Windmills of St Martins-le-Grand, London, son of the great clockmaker Joseph Windmills, became a member of the Clockmakers' Company in 1695 and like his father, Master of the Company in 1718.

The movement has three trains with locking plate, strike and chiming on 8 bells and 16 hammers. The maker's name is printed on part of a paper label remaining on the back of the case door, indicating that this clock belonged to Percy Webster.

W.17:1 to 6-1937