Exhibition-grade clock-watch by Alexander Watkins, London, 1851. Mahogany outer box with case-lid lined in silk. Gold watch case, profusely engraved. Four-coloured gold dial, with day-of-the-month dial. Steel hands. Movement of eight-day duration with quarter-striking as well as repeating on 5 gongs. Spring-detent escapement. Backplate profusely engraved, and signed 'Alexr. Watkins, City Road 1851. London'. Clockmakers' Museum No. 449

The watch was made for the Great Exhibition of 1851, held at the Crystal Palace in Hyde Prk. The inscription printed on silk inside the outer box reads 'GRAND EXHIBITION OF ALL NATIONS.

IN LONDON, 1851. ALEX WATKINS. 67, STRAND, Inventor and Maker of Chronometers Extraordinary. Class 10-No. 85a. An original eight-day CHRONOMETER REPEATER - the labour of eight years - striking the hours of itself and chiming the quarters upon a set of five bells; likewise showing the day of the month. In the whole there are two hundred pieces of mechaniam. This watch has a newly invented compensation to equalise the extreme temperatures. From the Offcial, Descriptive and Illustrated Catalogue.'