Clocks · Longcase clock
Small mahogany longcase clock by Handy, Uxbridge, c. 1800
- Maker / attribution
- Handy (maker)
- Date
- c. 1800
- Historical period
- Precision & Scientific Horology (1750 – 1850)
- Country of origin
- England
- Place
- Uxbridge
- Object type
- Longcase clock
- Materials / technique
- mahogany, ebony, satinwood
- Dimensions
- Height 6 ft 8 in (203 cm)
- Stock no.
- Product 501
- Credit line
- Dealer listing, P A Oxley (product 501)
- Catalogue title (original)
- Small Mahogany Longcase clock by Handy of Uxbridge (English)
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Record summary
Catalogued by P A Oxley (dealer), Wiltshire (stock number Product 501), this is a longcase clock by Handy, made in Uxbridge, England, dated c. 1800. The Atlas places it in the Precision & Scientific Horology period (1750 – 1850) of its Clocks collection. Materials and techniques recorded by the source: mahogany, ebony, satinwood. Recorded dimensions: Height 6 ft 8 in (203 cm). The record is illustrated with 6 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 — P A Oxley
An excellent example of provincial Clockmaking with London features. The 8 day duration movement with a recoil anchor escapement and striking the hours on a bell. The dial is laid out with a separate silvered brass chapter ring with Roman numerals and Arabic minutes. Matching blued steel hands of the popular diamond pattern are found to the centre, as are the date and seconds dials. The Clockmakers name and place of work is also engraved to the centre, George Handy, Uxbridge. The arch and corners are decorated with ornate spandrels and a very useful strike/silent facility. The unusual and small mahogany case has a single plinth and well figured veneered mahogany with beautiful patina to the trunk door and base. The base also with boxwood and ebony inlay to the front elevation along with a reeded moulding. The trunk with a long door, unusual satinwood crossbanding and framed by double brass reeded quarter columns terminating with brass Doric capitals. The hood features separate reeded pillars with Doric capitals, quarter pillars to the rear and a plain broken arch top with boxwood and ebony inlay. Note: George Handy is listed as working as a Watchmaker in Uxbridge towards the end of the 18th century. Its interesting to see some very common London features within the case of this clock but also some âquirkyâ features such as the satinwood crossbanding, the boxwood and ebony inlay and the double brass reeded pillars. A rare and unusual clock of pleasing proportions and size. Maker Handy of Uxbridge
Historical context
Precision & Scientific Horology (1750 – 1850)
Harrison solves longitude; Mudge invents the lever; Breguet's Paris workshop defines the modern watch.
The age of the deadbeat escapement, compensated pendulums and observatory regulators. Domestic clocks spread through the middle classes: English longcase and bracket clocks, French gilt-bronze mantel clocks, Viennese Biedermeier wall clocks, Black Forest painted-shield clocks, and the first American shelf clocks.
Read the period in the timelineMore clocks from this periodEarlier: Early Modern Horology
Atlas type guide
Longcase (tall-case or grandfather) clocks
The longcase clock was born from two seventeenth-century innovations: Christiaan Huygens's pendulum (1656–57) and the anchor escapement (c. 1670). A long seconds pendulum, nearly a metre long, swings with a small arc, and enclosing it together with the driving weights in a tall wooden case protected the mechanism and created a new piece of furniture. London makers such as Ahasuerus Fromanteel, Thomas Tompion and Joseph Knibb set the pattern.
By the eighteenth century longcase clocks were made throughout Britain, the Netherlands, Scandinavia (the Swedish Mora clock), France (the Comtoise from the Franche-Comté), Germany and colonial America. Eight-day movements with two weights became standard in better clocks; thirty-hour clocks with one weight and a rope or chain were cheaper alternatives.
What to look for
- Winding holes in the dial: two (eight-day, going and striking) or none (thirty-hour, pulled up by a chain).
- Brass dials with applied chapter rings (earlier) versus painted iron 'white' dials (after c. 1770 in Britain).
- Moon-phase arches, date apertures, seconds dials and maker's name on the dial.
- Case woods and style: ebonised, walnut marquetry, lacquer, oak or mahogany; regional styles from London, Lancashire, Scotland or America.
- Whether the movement and dial match the case — 'marriages' are common.
Dating clues
- Square brass dials suggest c. 1670–1720; arched brass dials c. 1715–1790.
- Painted (white) dials were made by Birmingham dial-makers from about 1772.
- Comtoise clocks with repoussé pendulums are mostly nineteenth century.
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:Deadbeat escapementAnchor escapement
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