I carry the Burgess watch as my daily-wear time piece, and the Sulgrove watch is for dress and costume use. The Sulgrove watch ticks audibly in smaller spaces, like the car. Both keep fairly accurate time, as long as they're wound at least twice a day.
On my 31st birthday I received my great-grandfather Byron
Sulgrove's Hamilton pocket
watch. The watch was purchased for him by his wife, my great
grandmother. While Hamilton is famed as a maker of railroad watches,
this watch has the stem at 3 o'clock (like the hunting case models,
but open faced) and is not officially a railroad watch.
The watch body opens where the face crystal unscrews. After pulling the stem button completely out, the interior mechanism swings out on a hinge near the stem. The gold-colored case is not stamped with any information about the metal's composition. The watch weighs 4.5 oz (126 g)
The watch is a model 941, serial number 696849, manufactured in 1906. It has a second hand over the 6 o'clock position and merely says "Hamilton" on the face. It has black arabic numerals for the hours and red numberals for every five minutes. The mechanism says "Hamilton Watch Co.", "Double Roller", "21 Jewels", "941", "Adjusted 5 Positions", "Lancaster, Pa." in type.
The inside of the back cover says "B&B ROYAL EXC", "659232" stamped in block type and has "363HH", "97985", "6839L", "N1165M", "5615-L" & "5189-L" (scratched through) etched in uneven script. The flat edge of the watch mechanism is stamped "2642"
Jane's great-grandfather John Burgess' Hamilton pocket watch came to me at a family reunion. This watch has the stem at the 12 o'clock position, and is an official railroad watch.
The watch body opens where the face crystal unscrews. The back also unscrews to reveal the interior mechanism. The silver-colored case is stamped "14K Gold Filled" which presumably indicates white gold in this case.
The watch is a model 992, serial number 2337070, manufactured between 1925 and 1930. It has a second hand over the 6 o'clock position and merely says "Hamilton" on the face. It has black arabic numerals for the hours and red numerals for every five minutes. The mechanism says "Hamilton Watch Co.", "2337070", "Double Roller", "21 Jewels", "992", "Adjusted 5 Positions", "Made in U.S.A", "Lancaster, Pa." in type.
The inside of the back cover says "14K Gold Filled", "-HAMILTON-", "Railroad Model" stamped in block type and has "c7-31mm", "m1274", "W185", "444c" & "238c" etched in uneven script.
The edge of the watch case has a checker-board pattern, like a double row of dental molding. This pattern is on both the front and back of the watch case. The watch came to me with a silver-colored chain which has no provenance.