Instruments · Marine chronometer
Marine chronometer by Parkinson & Frodsham
- Maker / attribution
- Parkinson & Frodsham (maker)
- Date
- c. 1840
- Historical period
- Precision & Scientific Horology (1750 – 1850)
- Country of origin
- England
- Object type
- Marine chronometer
- Dimensions
- Height 17 cm
- Stock no.
- Product 2988
- Credit line
- Dealer listing, The Antique Clock Company (product 2988)
- Catalogue title (original)
- SMALL PARKINSON & FRODSHAM MARINE CHRONOMETER No. 2022 (English)
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Record summary
Catalogued by The Antique Clock Company (dealer), Dorset (stock number Product 2988), this is a marine chronometer by Parkinson & Frodsham, made in England, dated c. 1840. The Atlas places it in the Precision & Scientific Horology period (1750 – 1850) of its Instruments collection. Recorded dimensions: Height 17 cm. The record is illustrated with 4 photographs.
Assembled from the source record's structured fields. Dates and attributions are given as the source states them; where a field is missing the Atlas leaves it blank rather than estimating.
Catalogue description
Dealer description — The Antique Clock Company
The 3 ½” silvered Roman and Arabic dial signed and numbered Parkinson & Frodsham, Change Alley, London No. 2022. Fine blued steel hands, subsidiary seconds and up-down dials, small size two day duration movement (56mm diameter), the spot-finished top plate signed Parkinson & Frodsham Change Alley London, chain fusee with Earnshaw escapement, cut bimetallic balance with wedge-shaped heat compensation weights, blued steel helical balance, brass casing with cushion springs to the underside and within brass bowl and gimbal; three-tier mahogany box with external brass handles to the sides, signed and numbered bone plaques to the front. Height: 6 ¾” or 17 cm Width: 6″ or 15.5 cm Depth: 6″ or 15.5 cm
Provenance
Private collection – U.K.
Historical context
Precision & Scientific Horology (1750 – 1850)
Harrison solves longitude; Mudge invents the lever; Breguet's Paris workshop defines the modern watch.
The longitude problem was solved by the marine chronometer and lunar distance methods; dividing engines made precision scales possible, and observatories set time by transit instruments.
Read the period in the timelineMore instruments from this periodEarlier: Early Modern Horology
Atlas type guide
Marine chronometers
A marine chronometer is a precision timekeeper carried at sea to find longitude: the navigator compares local noon, observed with a sextant, with the time at a reference meridian kept by the chronometer. Each hour of difference corresponds to fifteen degrees of longitude. John Harrison proved the method in the 1760s; Pierre Le Roy, Ferdinand Berthoud, John Arnold and Thomas Earnshaw then developed the detent escapement and the compensation balance that made chronometers practical to manufacture.
By the nineteenth century London, Liverpool, Le Locle and Glashütte supplied navies and merchant fleets. A typical box chronometer has a spring-detent escapement, a fusee to equalise mainspring torque, a bimetallic compensation balance with a helical balance spring, and is mounted in gimbals inside a wooden box so that it stays level.
What to look for
- Gimbals and a three-tier wooden box with a glazed inner lid.
- A power-reserve ('up and down') indicator on the dial, usually showing 56 hours on two-day instruments.
- Spring-detent escapement and a cylindrical (helical) balance spring visible through the movement.
- Admiralty or navy marks (broad arrow), and rating certificates from observatories.
- The maker's number on the dial and movement; many makers' registers survive, allowing dating.
Dating clues
- Earnshaw-type spring-detent chronometers became standard after about 1800.
- Auxiliary compensation devices on the balance appear from the mid-nineteenth century.
- Quartz and radio time signals ended routine use of mechanical chronometers in the 1970s and 1980s.
General guidance written by the Atlas editors about this kind of object. It is not a statement about this particular piece; for that, rely on the source record above and on physical examination.
Read next:Spring detent (chronometer) escapementBalance spring (hairspring)Detent escapement
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